of persons found in actual charge of large areas of land, and (2) an assessment of such reasonable sum as could be discovered by comparing the accounts of actual payments in previous years; the sum so fixed being declared unalterable for ever.

SECTION VI.-THE MAIN PRINCIPLES OF THE BENGAL SETTLEMENT AND WHAT HAS RESULTED FROM THEM.

§1. Special features of the Settlement.

About this PERMANENT (Zamíndárí) Settlement, there are three things to be observed.

I. The system involved the presumption that for every local estate or group of lands there must be some person with whom Government should settle, or (in official phrase) who should hold the Settlement'; and further, that this person, or middleman between the raiyat and the State, should be vested with a proprietary interest in the land. The benefits and obligations in such an arrangement or contract were to be reciprocal. The Government was to have some one who was to be looked to as responsible, in person and estate, for punctual payment; the person was to be given the means of discharging his responsibility by having a secure title to the land for which he engaged. He was to be irremoveable (otherwise than temporarily, in the event of his not agreeing to the terms offered). He was to be at liberty to raise money on the credit of the land, to sell or gift it, or pass it on to his children by inheritance or bequest, as the case might be. In other words, he was to be declared and legally installed as proprietor or landlord.

This principle has always been followed, either in set terms or in some equivalent shape, in all Settlement systems.

In all systems which deal with a landlord, the middleman may be an actual person or an ideal person—a body or a community considered as one legal person, by means

of a representative (as in the North-Western Settlements). In other systems, where there is no middleman, actual or ideal, the cultivator is directly settled with. In the former case, under whatever necessary limitations, the Zamíndár, the Taluqdár, or joint body of village co-sharers, is 'owner' or 'proprietor. To say that a man is 'proprietor,' and that he is the 'málguzár' or revenue-payer, are, in our official literature, practically synonymous; to say that a man pays four annas of the revenue, means also that he is owner of one-fourth of the estate, fractions being commonly stated in so many 'annas' (sixteenths) of the 'rupee' (taken as the total). And even in Madras and Bombay, where (as explained in Chapter IV) no landlord body had grown up over the village cultivators, so that they could not be regarded as a jointly responsible proprietary of the whole, the individual occupants were nevertheless vested by law with a definite, transferable, and heritable right, subject to the revenue demand and this, for most practical purposes, is undistinguishable from a proprietary title 1.

II. Another thing to be observed in the Bengal Settlement is, that the amount of revenue to be paid by the Zamíndár being once ascertained, that amount was fixed for ever under the law of 1793. Hence this first experiment in Settlements is called the PERMANENT SETTLEMENT. III. The amount was determined, not with reference to any area-survey, any consideration, that is, of the number, various fertility, or productive power, of the acres held in each case, or of the influence of proximity to market and facility of communication, on the value of produce. Local scrutiny, as we shall see, was directly forbidden to the Collectors; they were directed to make the best estimate they could, of a fair lump sum for the whole estate, on a consideration of what sums had been paid in the past, and of the general prosperity of the owners.

1 For remarks on the occupancy rights in Bombay, see the chapter on Land-Tenures in Bombay. The Madras raiyat has not had his

tenure defined by statute, but is practically settled by judicial decision to be proprietor of his holding.

§ 2. Remarks on the three features.

These features demand some. further remark, as having given rise to various and important results.

The first feature in itself needs no comment, especially in view of our immediate subject. But indirectly, the question of 'proprietor' and his 'title' have given rise to all those difficult questions about grades of proprietary interest and privileges of tenant-right, which have been such a source of controversy in India. An outline of the subject was presented in Chap. IV. Sec. iv. p. 196.

83. The second feature.

This feature-the permanency of the assessment—has had a great influence. For a long time, and under other methods of Settlement, which we shall have to discuss, people thought that as soon as a fairly good method was elaborated, the resulting assessment might be declared fixed and unalterable. After the first Settlements of the North-West Provinces, for example, a great discussion arose, and was continued for some years; indeed, the question of a Permanent Settlement for all districts lingered on, till it received its quietus in a despatch of the Secretary of State in 1882. The history of this question is important, but will not be understood till some description of the other Settlement systems has been given. I therefore defer its further mention for the present.

84. Effects of Laws for the Realization of Revenue.

But connected with this subject, though, perhaps, indirectly, is the law enacted for the realization of the

revenue.

While the Government had conferred valuable rights on the Zamíndárs, it required of them (what they had been little in the habit of rendering) a prompt and punctual payment of the fixed revenue amount. From the first it

2

was notified that if the instalments ('kist,' or properly qist') were not paid at due date, the estate would be sold. Government would not imprison the person of the landlord, nor take his private goods and chattels'; that would be an indignity. As will appear more fully in the sequel, circumstances brought about a vast number of sales for arrears of revenue during the first ten years. And as these sales introduced a purchaser who necessarily had a clear title, another bouleversement of the tenant relations resulted. This last is a question of tenures, and does not now concern us; but the subject of 'sale-law' is here mentioned, as it is a distinctive feature of the old Bengal revenue-administration.

§ 5. Remarks on the third feature.

The fact that the Permanent Settlement was made without any survey, and without any record of landed rights and interests, has proved more fraught with evil consequences than perhaps any other feature of the Settlement. It is difficult now to say what Lord Cornwallis really thought when he prohibited any detailed scrutiny of the estates; but his first object was to be liberal to the Zamíndár, and to make him feel secure as to the intentions of the Government; and to do this it seemed important to prohibit all minute inquisition into his affairs or rents, and to fix a lump assessment on general considerations. For the same reasons, it was impossible to harass him with conditions about his subordinate tenants and with vexa

It was

tious interference in his dealings with them. supposed that the newly-acknowledged landlord would extend cultivation, and thereby enlarge his own receipts; that he would improve the class of crops grown; and, as differential rates were always acknowledged for richer and poorer crops, it was vaguely supposed that rentals would rise in this way. Whatever the process, the landlord would certainly become rich; on the other hand, he would employ and liberally pay, more and more labour; everywhere he would be known as the benevolent landlord of a contented tenantry; he would abstain, under the strict orders of Government, from levying 'cesses' in addition to the rents, which latter, it was supposed, would settle themselves by the good understanding of both parties; he would always grant a 'patta' (pottah) to his tenants, and so have it definitely on record what land they held, and what rent they were to pay. Lastly, as both classes grew rich, though the land-revenue would not alter, other revenues would increase; for wealthy people demand more and more in the way of foreign imports and articles of luxury, and the custom-house would reap the benefit in the shape of duty. All these expectations have been rudely disappointed, with some rare exceptions; the Zamíndárs, as a class, did nothing for the tenants but rackrent them, or hand them over to 'patnidárs' or rent-farmers, who did so still more. They made no improvements; and their wealth did not augment the general revenues by income from other sources of indirect taxation. All the while, the want of a survey (for revenue purposes) has been seriously felt. Agricultural statistics, which are available. for other provinces, are wanting in Bengal. But even to enumerate the inconveniences, the difficulties under the tenant-law, and the endless litigation, that the absence of an authoritative record of subordinate rights may cause, would occupy more space than I can here give. In short, some day a district cadastral survey and a record of rights and rents must come; and the sooner it is commenced, the better it will be for the province.