Hobson-Jobson: A Glossary of Colloquial Anglo-Indian Words and Phrases, and of Kindred Terms, Etymological, Historical, Geographical and Discursive c10.73

c10.73

In 1770 the Government resolved that Civil Courts, independent of the Provincial Councils, should be established in the six divisions named above,† each under a civilian judge with the title of Superintendent of the Dewanny Adawlut; whilst to the Councils should still pertain the trial of causes relating to the public revenue, to the demands of zemindars upon their tenants, and to boundary questions. The appeal from the District Courts still lay to the Governor-General and his Council, as forming the Court of Sudder Dewanny; but that this might be real, a judge was appointed its head in the person of Sir Elijah Impey, the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, an appointment which became famous. For it was represented as a transaction intended to compromise the acute dissensions.