History of Orissa from the Earliest Times to the British Period v2.c44.50

v2.c44.50

Having control of judicial and executive work, the Bengali found Orissa an easy means to get rich quick. He had no competitors in the field and the British officers had to rely entirely on them. Police extortion and sale of public justice was carried on entirely through Bengalis. The British East India Company realised the gravity of the offences of their officers too late in the great crisis of 1817 when the Holkar's army expiated for the sins of Yaśovant Rāo at the battle of Mehidpur and the Bhonsle's troops—for the lesser sins of Raghuji II committed in not rejoining Yaśovant Rāo Holkar and Daulat Rāo Śinde after 1803,—at the glorious battles of Sitābaldi and Nagpur. Some day the true history of the Fourth Maratha War and the great battles of Ashṭā, Koregāon, Mehidpur and Sitābaldi will be written, but the time is not yet ripe. In Orissa the contemporaneous movement was the rebellion of the pāiks, the national militia of Orissa. The causes of their discontent and that of their leader were simply the rapacity of British Officers in Orissa and their Bengali subordinates. It is useless at the present day to recapitulate the long and rambling narrative of Toynbee, the shorter sketch of O'Malley will be sufficient. At the time of the British conquest of Orissa, British officers were still imbued with the idea of the permanent settlement introduced by Cornwallis into Bengal, Behar and Benares. Immediately after the conquest, the British Commissioners for the settlement of the Ṣūbah of Orissa decided to cancel all demands on account of arrears of revenue. In 1804 the first settlement of revenue was made in Orissa and it was embodied in Regulation XII of 1805. This settlement was for one year only and was to be followed by a triennial settlement. The triennial settlement was effected but was followed in 1808-9 by another settlement for four years. Then followed a number of hasty settlements concluded according to the advice of Bengali Ministerial officers to whom a settlement always brought a golden harvest in the shape of bribes in cash and kind, nazars to the European officers and starvation and ruin alike to the peasants and their proprietors. These disastrous settlements were concluded in 1812-13 for one year, 1813-14 for two years and in 1815-16 again for one year. When the crisis came another settlement was made in 1816-17 for three years. In the meanwhile the majority of British officers were totally ignorant of the country, its capability of producing crops, and devastation on account of bad government of more than half a century, and they had to rely on their Bengali subordinates for every bit of information that they got. The Oṛiyās were very shy and mistrusted their new masters. They held back papers of Hastabud [This page is blank]