Civil Disobedience in Indian Tradition, with Some Early Nineteenth Century Documents c6.s3.55

c6.s3.55

21. The extent of the sacrifices of revenue and the heavy charges which were incurred upon the introduction of the permanent settlement of the land revenue and the judicial system, the accumulating expenses attending those arrangements and the long continuance of internal peace and prosperity in the provinces of Bengal and Behar arising in a general measure out of the burdensome wars in which we have been involved in other parts of India will warrant us fully in calling upon our native subjects to contribute to the relief of the state, now heavily expressed by a great load of debt, incurred by those wars, and which we had only contemplated as a contingency to be provided against in our letter of May 1799. The stamp duty established by you appears to be a measure well calculated to improve our revenues, and we have therefore read with great satisfaction in your Revenue Consultations of the 9th October 1806 that whatever has been received under this head in the Conquered Provinces (where the Regulation requiring the issue of stamp paper had not then been promulgated) 'is you suppose to be ascribed to individuals entertaining an opinion that the stamped paper gives great validity to documents of the above kind than if they were written upon plain paper'.