Volume 1

Rambles and recollections of an Indian official / [Sir William Henry Sleeman].

  • William Henry Sleeman
Date:
1893
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Rambles and recollections of an Indian official / [Sir William Henry Sleeman]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    261/492 page 221
    NATIVE ADMINISTRATION 221 ancestors have served the Raja for several generations. The Diwan, who has charge of the treasury, receives only one thousand rupees a year, and the Bakshi, or paymaster of the army, who seems at present to rule the state as the prime favourite, the same. These latter are at present the only two great officers of state ; and, though they are, no doubt, realizing handsome incomes by indirect means, they dare not make any display, lest signs of wealth might induce the Raja or his successors to treat them as their pre- decessors in office were treated for some time past.' The Jagirdms, or feudal chiefs, as I have before stated, are almost all of the same family or class as the Raja, and they spend all the revenues of their estates in the maintenance of military retainers, upon whose courage and fidelity they can generally rely. These Jagirdars are bound to attend the prince on all great occasions, and at certain intervals ; and are made to contribute something to his exchequer in tribute. Almost all live beyond their legitimate means, and make up the deficiency by maintaining upon their estates gangs of thieves, robbers, and murderers, who extend their depredations into the country around, and share the prey with these chiefs, and their officers and under-tenants. They keep them as poachers keep their dogs ; and the para- mount power, whose subjects they plunder, might as well ask them for the best horse in the stable as for the best thief that lives under their protection. ~ I should mention an incident that occurred during the ^ Ante, Chapter XXIII, p. 171. In the Gwalior territory, the Maratha “ amils ” or governors of distiicts, do the same, and keep gangs of robbers on purpose to plunder theii neighbours ; and, if you ask them for their thieves, they will actually tell you that to part with them would be ruin, as they are their only defence against the thieves of their neighbours. [W. H. S.] These notions and habits are by no means extinct. In October, 1892, a force of about two hundred men, cavalry and infantry, was sent into Bundelkhand to suppress robber gangs. Such gangs are constantly breaking out in that region, in most native states, and in many British districts. See ante, p. 178.
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