INDIA UNDER THE BRITISH CROWN
The Queen’s Proclamation, 1st November 1858
It fell to the lot of Lord Canning both to suppress the Mutiny and to introduce the peaceful revolution which followed. He preserved his equanimity unruffled in the darkest hours of peril; and the strict impartiality of his conduct incurred alternate praise and blame from partisans of both sides. The epithet then scornfully applied to him, of “Clemency” Canning, is now remembered only to his honour. On 1st November 1858, at a grand darbar held at Allahabad, he sent forth the royal proclamation, which announced that the Queen had assumed the government of India. This document, which is, in the truest and noblest sense, the Magna Charta of the Indian people, declared in eloquent words the principles of justice and religious toleration as the guiding policy of the Queen’s rule. It also granted an amnesty to all except those who had directly taken part in the murder of British subjects. Peace was proclaimed throughout India on the 8th July 1859. In the following cold weather, Lord Canning made a viceregal progress through the Northern Provinces, to receive the homage of loyal Princes and Chiefs, and to guarantee to them the right of adoption.
Mr. Wilson’s Financial Reforms
The suppression of the Mutiny increased the debt of India by about 40 millions sterling; and the military changes which ensued augmented the annual expenditure by about 10 millions. To grapple with this deficit, a distinguished political economist and parliamentary financier, the Right Honourable James Wilson, was sent out from England as financial member of Council. He reorganized the customs system, imposed an income tax and a licence duty, and created a State paper currency. He died in the midst of his splendid task; but his name still lives as that of the first and greatest finance minister of India. The Bengal Tenancy Act, a memorable measure which secured the land-rights of the peasantry of Bengal, was passed under Lord Canning’s auspices in 1859; the Penal Code, originally drawn up by Macaulay in 1837, became law in 1860; with Codes of Civil and Criminal Procedure in 1861.
Lord Elgin, 1862-1863
Lord Canning left India in March 1862, and died before he had been a month in England. His successor, Lord Elgin, only lived till November 1863. He expired at the Himalayan station of Dharmsala, and there he lies buried.
Lord Lawrence, 1864-1869
He was succeeded by Sir John Lawrence, the saviour of the Punjab. The chief incidents of his rule were the Bhutan war, followed by the annexation of the Dwars (Dooars), a submontane strip on the North-Eastern frontier of Bengal, in 1864, and the terrible Orissa famine of 1866. In a later famine in Bundelkhand and Upper Hindustan in 1868-1869, Lord Lawrence laid down the principle, for the first time in Indian history, that the officers of the Government would be held personally responsible for taking every possible means to avert death by starvation. An inquiry was conducted into the status of the peasantry of Oudh, and an Act was passed with a view to securing them in their customary rights. After a period of fratricidal war among the sons of Dost Muhammad, the Afghan territories were concentrated in the hands of Sher Ali, who was acknowledged as Amir by Lord Lawrence. A commercial crisis took place in 1866, which seriously threatened the young tea industry in Bengal, and caused widespread ruin at Bombay. Sir John Lawrence retired in January 1869, after having passed through every grade of Indian service, from an assistant magistracy to the viceroyalty. On his return to England, he was raised to the peerage. He died in 1879, and lies in Westminster Abbey.
Lord Mayo, 1869-1872
Lord Mayo succeeded Lord Lawrence in 1869, and urged on the material progress of India. The Ambala darbar, at which Sher Ali was formally recognized as Amir of Afghanistan, although in one sense the completion of what Lord Lawrence had begun, owed its brilliant success to Lord Mayo (1869). The visit of His Royal Highness the Duke of Edinburgh in 1869-1870 gave deep pleasure to the natives of India, and introduced a tone of personal loyalty into our relations with the feudatory princes. Lord Mayo reformed several of the great branches of the administration, created an Agricultural Department, and introduced the system of Provincial Finance. The impulse to local self-government given by the last measure has done much, and will do more, to develope and husband the revenues of India, to quicken the sense of responsibility among the English administrators, and to awaken political life among the people. Lord Mayo also laid the foundation for the reform of the salt duties. He thus enabled his successors to abolish the old pernicious customs-lines which had for long walled off Province from Province, and strangled the trade between British India and the Feudatory States. He developed the material resources of the country by an immense extension of roads, railways, and canals. He carried out the beneficent system of public works which Lord Dalhousie had inaugurated. Lord Mayo’s splendid vigour defied alike the climate and the vast tasks which he imposed on himself. He anxiously and laboriously studied with his own eyes the wants of the farthest Provinces of the empire. But his life of noble usefulness was cut short by the hand of an assassin, in the convict settlement of the Andaman Islands, in 1872.
Lord Northbrook, 1872-1876
His successor was Lord Northbrook, whose ability found pre-eminent scope in the department of finance. During his viceroyalty, a famine which threatened Lower Bengal in 1874 was successfully averted by a vast organization of State relief. The Maratha Gaekwar of Baroda was dethroned in 1875 for misgovernment, and for his attempt to poison the British Resident at his Court. But his dominions were continued to a child of his race. The Prince of Wales made a tour through the country in the cold weather of 1875-1876. The presence of His Royal Highness evoked a passionate burst of loyalty never before known in the annals of British India. The feudatory Chiefs and ruling houses of India felt for the first time that they were incorporated into the Empire of an ancient and a splendid dynasty.
Lord Lytton, 1876-1880
Lord Lytton followed Lord Northbrook in 1876. On January 1, 1877, Queen Victoria was proclaimed Empress of India at a darbar of unparalleled magnificence, held on the historic “ridge” overlooking the ancient Mughal capital of Delhi. But while the princes and high officials of the country were flocking to this gorgeous scene, the shadow of famine was darkening over Southern India. The monsoons of 1876 had failed to bring their due supply of rain, and the season of 1877 was little better. This long-continued drought stretched from the Deccan to Cape Comorin, and subsequently invaded Northern India, causing a famine more widely spread than any similar calamity known in Indian history. Despite vast importations of grain by sea and rail, despite the most strenuous exertions of the Government, which incurred a total expenditure on this account of 11 millions sterling, the loss of life from actual starvation and its attendant train of diseases was lamentable. The deaths from want of food, and from the diseases incident to a famine-stricken population, were estimated at 5½ millions.
Afghan Affairs, 1878-1880
In the autumn of 1878, the affairs of Afghanistan again forced themselves into notice. Sher Ali, the Amir, who had been hospitably entertained by Lord Mayo, was found to be favouring Russian intrigues. A British envoy was refused admittance to the country, while a Russian mission was received with honour. This led to a declaration of war. British armies advanced by three routes,—the Khaibar (Khyber), the Kuram, and the Bolan,—and without much opposition occupied the inner entrances of the passes (1878). Sher Ali fled to Afghan Turkistan, and there died. A treaty was entered into with his son, Yakub Khan, at Gandamak (May 1879), by which the British frontier was advanced to the crests or Afghan edge of the passes, and a British officer was admitted to reside at Kabul. Within a few months, the British Resident, Sir Louis Cavagnari, was treacherously attacked and massacred, together with his escort (September 1879), and a second war became necessary.
Yakub Khan abdicated, and was deported to India; Kabul and Kandahar were occupied in force, and a national rising of the Afghan tribes, which imperilled the British garrison at Kabul, was decisively repulsed by Sir Frederick Roberts (1879-80).
Marquess of Ripon, 1880-84
At this crisis a general election in England resulted in the defeat of the Conservative Ministry. Lord Lytton resigned along with the Home Government, and the Marquess of Ripon was appointed his successor in April 1880. In that summer a British brigade suffered defeat at Maiwand, between Kandahar and the Helmand river, from the Herat troops of Ayub Khan,—a defeat promptly retrieved by the brilliant march of General Sir Frederick Roberts from Kabul to Kandahar, and by the total rout of Ayub Khan’s army on 1st September 1880. Abdur Rahman Khan, the eldest male representative of the stock of Dost Muhammad, was recognized by us as Amir. The British forces retired from Kabul, leaving Abdur Rahman in possession of the capital (1881). Ayub Khan again took the field. His success, however, was short-lived, and Abdur Rahman is still sovereign in Afghanistan (July 1895). Lord Ripon availed himself of the unbroken peace which has prevailed in India since 1881 to enter on a series of internal reforms. The years 1882 and 1883 will be memorable for these great measures. By repealing the Vernacular Press Act, he set free the native journals from the last restraints on the free discussion of public questions. His scheme of Local Self-Government has opened a new era of political life to the natives of India. At the same time, by the appointment of an Education Commission, with a view to the spread of popular instruction on a broader basis, he has sought to fit the people for the safe exercise of the rights which he has conferred. He also laid the foundations for the great measure of land-legislation for Bengal which was passed into law under his successor, Lord Dufferin. In 1882, Lord Ripon’s Finance Minister, Sir Evelyn Baring, took off the import duties on cotton goods, and the whole Indian import duties were, with a few exceptions, abolished. This distinguished financier left India in the following year (1883), to assume the high office of British Representative at Cairo, amid the universal regret of the Indian people.
In 1882, a contingent of Indian Native troops was sent to take part with the British forces in the successful occupation of Egypt. They displayed conspicuous powers of endurance in the campaign, and of gallantry in the field. A chosen band of the Indian officers and men were afterwards sent to England, and received an enthusiastic welcome from all classes of the people. Early in his rule Lord Ripon had re-established the Department of Agriculture; and he took measures to guard the country against famine. In 1884 he deputed officers to England, to give evidence before the Parliamentary Committee, with a view to the extension of Indian railways. Lord Ripon retired at the end of 1884. Some of his measures for the promotion of local self-government, and especially his proposal to give to the higher class of Native judges a larger amount of jurisdiction in the case of offences committed by British-born subjects, were considered by the European community to be unsuited to the actual condition of India. But whether or not in advance of the time, it is now realized that they point out the directions in which progress must sooner or later take place. Lord Ripon loved the people, and was greatly beloved by them.
Marquess of Dufferin, 1884-88
The Earl of Dufferin succeeded as Viceroy, 1884. In the spring of 1885, Lord Dufferin held a magnificent Darbar at Rawalpindi for the reception of the Amir of Afghanistan, and strengthened our friendly relations with that ruler. In the summer, a war with Russia seemed imminent, and the Native States came forward with loyal offers of their armies and resources to the British government. Towards the end of 1885 the persistent misconduct of King Thebau in Upper Burma, his ill-treatment of British subjects, and his rejection of all conciliatory offers, led to an army being sent against him, under General Prendergast. The King was dethroned and removed to India. On the 1st January, 1886, his territories were annexed, and soon afterwards were constituted a British province together with Lower Burma under a Chief Commissioner. Early in 1886, also, a great camp of exercise was held on the memorable battle-plain of Panipat in the Punjab; and the fortress of Gwalior was given back by Lord Dufferin to the Mahárájá Sindhia. During 1887 Upper Burma was being gradually reduced to order, and the dakait bands were dispersed. In the same year the Jubilee (or fiftieth year of the reign) of the Queen-Empress Victoria was celebrated with universal enthusiasm. A Commission inquired into the question of more largely employing Native officers in the higher branches of the Administration. The Earl of Dufferin retired in 1888, and was created Marquess of Dufferin and Ava for his services.
The Marquess of Lansdowne, 1888-1894
The Marquess of Lansdowne, 1888-1894, succeeded Lord Dufferin. Under Lord Lansdowne’s rule (with Sir Frederick, afterwards Lord, Roberts as his Commander-in-Chief) the defences of the North-western frontier of India were strengthened, and the Passes from Afghánistán secured against any possible invaders. At the same time, the Native chiefs were allowed to take a more important position than before in the armies of India. A number of them had come forward with offers of money and troops to aid in the defence of the country. Under Lord Lansdowne these offers were accepted. Many of the Feudatories now maintain regiments, carefully drilled and armed, which in time of war would serve with the troops of the British Government. These regiments, kept up free of cost to the British Government, are a free-will offering to it from the loyalty of the Native princes, who have greatly prospered under British rule. They served with distinction in China in 1900. The institution by Lord Curzon of the Imperial Cadet Corps for young Indian chiefs and nobles, without necessarily leading to a military career, may give additional force and interest to the association of British and Native troops.
Progress of Self-government
While the Native princes are thus zealous to aid the Sovereign Power, the peoples and races in the British provinces have been learning the first lessons of local self-government. Municipal Councils and District Boards have, during the past forty years, been gradually created throughout India. Their members consist chiefly of Native gentlemen, many of whom are elected by their fellow citizens. These Municipal Councils and District Boards now manage many branches of the Local Administration. Their legal powers and their practical ability to do good work are increasing. At the same time, a ‘National Congress’ of delegates from all parts of India has since 1886 been held each December in one of the provincial capitals, such as Calcutta, Madras, Bombay, and Allahábád. This Congress discusses plans for opening a larger share in the work of legislation and in the higher branches of the executive administration, to natives of India. In 1892 the British Parliament passed an Act which increased the number of the members of the Legislative Councils, and introduced a stronger non-official element. Under that Act the Local Governments in India worked out a system of electing members to the Legislative Councils in accordance with the needs and conditions of each province. The year 1893 will be memorable for the first general election of representative members to the Indian Legislative Councils. Side by side with this political movement, efforts (which to a partial extent were embodied into legislation by Lord Lansdowne) are being made to reform certain evils in the social and domestic life of the Hindus, arising out of the customs of child-marriage and of the enforced celibacy of Hindu widows. The whole tendency of these efforts, under the guidance of the social reformer Mr. Malabari, is to protect young Indian girls and to improve the status of Indian women.
Fall in the Rupee, 1893-95, leading to Financial Settlement, 1899
The continued fall in the rupee, from its nominal value of two shillings to an actual value of about 1s. 2d., seriously embarrassed the Indian finances. India had yearly to remit about 18 million pounds sterling in gold to England, chiefly in payment of interest on loans, railway material, army charges, &c., and this sum, which would have amounted to 180 million rupees with the rupee equal to two shillings, would amount to 360 millions of rupees with the rupee at one shilling. The remedy proposed by the Government of India was bimetallism; that is, to establish a fixed ratio between silver and gold for purposes of coinage by international agreement. But as England and the Western nations could not combine to carry out that scheme, the Indian mints were closed for free coinage in 1893, in order to render rupees scarce and so to raise and to keep up their sterling value to 1s. 4d. This expectation was not realized, and the rupee continued to fall. In 1895 it sank to about 1s. 1d. A Royal Commission was then appointed to inquire into Indian finances, with a view, if possible, to reducing expenditure. After the presentation of its report a gold standard was established (1899), and fixity of exchange was secured. The rupee has since remained at 1s. 4d.
Army Reforms, 1890-95
The old system, by which the Indian armies were commanded by three separate Commanders-in-Chief in Bengal, Madras, and Bombay, had become antiquated, owing to the quicker communication between the three Presidencies by means of railways, steamers, and the telegraph. For a long time the Commander-in-Chief in Bengal had been also Commander-in-Chief for all India. It was therefore determined to have only one central Commander-in-Chief, with four Lieutenant-Generals under him at the head of the four great military divisions of Northern and Southern India. The separate Commands-in-Chief for Madras and Bombay were abolished. The change was gradually carried out 1890-95.
Religious Riots, 1893
In 1893 the old religious strife between the Hindus and Musalmáns broke out afresh. A series of fanatical riots took place at the festivals of the two faiths in many of the British provinces and Native states of India, from Burma to the North-west and Bombay. In some of these tumults, especially in the city of Bombay, much blood was shed, men were killed, and houses were burned. By the end of 1893 the excitement had calmed down again.
The Earl of Elgin, 1894-98
In January, 1894, Lord Elgin succeeded Lord Lansdowne. Owing to financial straits, caused by the continued fall in the rupee, a five per cent. customs duty was imposed in 1894 on goods imported into India. After much discussion, this duty was extended to Manchester cotton-cloths of the finer qualities, with which the Indian mills do not compete. A curious panic was caused during the summer of 1894 by the secret smearing of multitudes of trees in Northern India, and hidden and ominous meanings were ascribed to it. But the practice was found to be a harmless act of certain devotees to call popular attention to the shrine of their god.
The Opium Commission, 1893-95
In 1893 a Royal Commission was issued to inquire into the results of using opium in India, and the possibility of prohibiting it. After examining many witnesses in England and India, eight of the nine Commissioners reported in 1895 that the results of using opium in India were much less harmful than had been supposed in England. It was found that opium sent scarcely any criminals to the Indian jails, scarcely any patients to the Indian hospitals, and scarcely any lunatics to the Indian asylums. It was proved that opium does not act, as alcohol does in Great Britain, as a cause of crime, disease, and death, while it is largely used as a remedy for fever and malaria. Parliament agreed with the Royal Commission’s Report, and declined to prohibit the use of opium in India.
The Indian Frontier Lines, 1890-95
During the Governor-Generalships of Lord Lansdowne and Lord Elgin a series of measures were taken to settle the boundaries of the Indian Empire at its south-eastern and north-western extremities. In the south-east the territories of Upper Burma, annexed in 1886, were moulded into a peaceful and prosperous British Province. The frontier line between Burma and China and Siam was marked out, and the spheres of British influence on the Burmese side and of French influence from the Tonquin side were defined. In the extreme north-west of India, the frontier between the British dominions and Afghanistan was fixed. The State of Kashmir entered on a new development by the settlement of its land-revenue and of the cultivators’ rights, on equitable principles, by a highly skilled British officer whom the Maharaja employed for that purpose. British influence was firmly established in the outlying provinces of Kashmir to the north, along the line of Hunza, Nagar, and Gilgit. On the Afghan frontier a successful expedition against the Waziris in 1895 ended in the settlement of the Afghan boundary line, and in the recognition of the British authority by the intervening hill tribes. A friendly treaty was made with Afghanistan by our envoy, Sir Henry Mortimer Durand, in 1894; and in 1895 a son of the Afghan Amir for the first time visited England. He received a magnificent reception, and visited the chief centres of British industry and commerce. The Central Asian boundary between the spheres of influence of Russia and Great Britain on the Pamirs was also defined by treaty in 1895.
The Chitral Expedition, 1895
In the beginning of 1895 a dispute occurred beyond the extreme north-western angle of India for the succession to the rulership of Chitral. The British political officer then at Chitral found himself involved in the struggle, was besieged in the Chitral fort, and defended himself with great gallantry against overwhelming odds. A powerful force was advanced from the Punjab to relieve him, while a smaller body of Indian and Kashmir troops marched to his aid across the snows from Gilgit. After the two expeditions had overcome great physical obstacles, from the height of the passes and the then almost inaccessible situation of Chitral, the enemy abandoned the siege of the fort. Our political officer at Chitral and his little garrison were saved, and the British influence was confirmed in that remote mountainous corner which, by the recent agreement with Russia, had come within fifty miles of the Russian sphere of influence in Central Asia.
Lord Curzon of Kedleston, 1898
In 1898 the Earl of Elgin was succeeded by Lord Curzon of Kedleston, who had already considerable experience of Indian needs. He formally assumed the office of Governor-General at Calcutta on January 6, 1899. Special commissions of inquiry were at once appointed with view to a series of schemes of administrative reforms, embracing Education in every branch, Police, Irrigation, and Railways. He undertook also a series of visits to Native States and parts of India never previously visited by a Viceroy, and was received everywhere with a cordiality which witnessed to the sense of security and strength which proceed from incorporation in the great unity of the Indian Empire. To him is also due the sustained policy of archaeological conservation and restoration, which will preserve to the peoples of India the great monuments, political, military, and religious, of the past as abiding memorials of the different ages of the long history of the land.
Military Reforms
These were continued and amplified. The Madras Army was reorganized, a large addition of British officers was made to the Native force, a transport service was created, and the entire Indian Army was re-armed. British troops were dispatched from India to South Africa, where they did valuable service in Natal at the beginning of the Boer War; and Native troops were sent to China, where they joined in the relief of the besieged Legations at Peking.
Agrarian Policy
Considerable reforms were undertaken under Lord Curzon in the system of Land Revenue Assessments, as well as special measures to arrest agricultural indebtedness. Especially notable is the Land Alienation Bill in the Punjab, by which an endeavour has been made to check the evils of growing debt and the consequent expropriation of the agricultural population. Much industrial legislation, 1901-1903, had the same object, of ameliorating the condition of the poorer classes; and as administrators of a reasoned policy, agricultural and financial, Sir Denzil Ibbetson and Sir Edward Law have done highly beneficial work. A Board of Scientific Advice has also been founded, and experiments in agricultural research and education have been planned and inaugurated.
The Bubonic Plague
The last decade of the nineteenth century was generally one of misfortune and distress. Early in October, 1896, the bubonic plague was certified to exist in the Bombay Presidency. It rapidly spread, in spite of hygienic precautions, and before the end of the year nearly half the population had fled. In 1897 and 1898 it increased in Poona and other parts of Western India, and the measures used to disinfect dwellings and treat plague-cases caused riots in several districts. In 1899, 1900, and 1901 the increase was very great in Bengal as well as in other parts of India, and it was not till 1902 that it showed any signs of diminution, and that only temporarily. The self-sacrificing work of doctors, nurses, ministers of religion and officials was warmly eulogized by the Government. Unhappily at the time of writing the plague is in Western and Central India as severe as ever.
The Famine, 1899-1900
At the same time India has been visited by a series of most severe famines, which affected five provinces of British India as well as many Native States: an area of over 400,000 square miles, and a population of about sixty millions. Relief was everywhere organized, and as many as 26 per cent. of the population were in receipt of assistance during the worst period in some parts of the country. In the five provinces the number of persons rose at one time to over four and a half millions, in all India to over six millions. During the whole period, owing to the strenuous exertions of the Government, the general mortality was less than in previous famines, and the distress more amply and swiftly relieved. A commission, under Sir A. MacDonnell, was appointed to consider the whole circumstances, and reported in May, 1901, making valuable suggestions for dealing with future outbreaks.
Creation of North-west Frontier Province
After long consideration it was decided at the end of 1901 to create a separate administration from the Punjab in a new North-West Frontier Province, under a Chief Commissioner directly subordinate to the Government of India. The creation was the occasion for the declaration of a policy of neither neglecting nor crushing the frontier tribes, but of military concentration and tribal conciliation. Military garrisons were withdrawn from transfrontier posts, and tribal militia and levies were welcomed and utilized in their place. The military bases were at the same time connected with the frontier posts by a system of light railways.
Afghanistan and the Frontier
In September, 1901, the Amir Abdur Rahman of Afghánistán died. He was succeeded by his son Habibulla, who began his rule well by an amnesty, and showed a disposition to maintain cordial relations with the British Government. The Viceroy’s visit to Nepál in 1901 was evidence of the friendly disposition of another neighbouring State with which in earlier days there had been war. Troubles in Wazirístán, among the Mahsud Waziris, where outrages on British subjects had been constant, were met by several small punitive expeditions; but the Viceroy, by measures of blockade followed by retaliatory sallies, secured a satisfactory settlement. The rectification of the Tibetan border was completed in 1902, when an addition of 350 square miles was made to British territory.
Death of Victoria, Empress of India
An epoch in the history of British India may well be thought to have ended with the life of the great Queen of England under whom the Indian Empire had, through the energy and devotion of her servants, both European and Native, and through many years of stress and suffering, advanced so greatly in wealth and unity and power. On January 22, 1901, closed the long life of devoted service to India as well as to England and of deep personal sympathy with all the highest aims of the Indian peoples. Nowhere in all the countries which she had ruled was there a more genuine sorrow, a more profound sense of loss, than in India—the corner-stone, as the Viceroy said in his commemoration of her, of the world-wide Empire which had been created in her day. She was felt to have been a true mother of her people. She had learnt in old age the Indian language: she had continually advised her representatives in the country with words of wise counsel and of tender sympathy for the people whom she had charged them to rule. At a meeting in which all classes and creeds were represented it was decided to commemorate her great services to India by a Victoria Hall in Calcutta, to contain and concentrate in memorial the historic interests of the different ages of the past of the great Indian Empire. The memories of heroic effort, the results of self-sacrificing service, associated with a long history, and consummated in the reign of one who gave so conspicuous an example of the highest public and private virtues, are fitly to be summed up in a permanent memorial in the capital city of the Indian Empire.
The Coronation Darbar, 1903
After a year of mourning, and after a postponement due to his own sudden and dangerous illness, Edward VII, who had himself visited India in 1875, was crowned at Westminster on August 9, 1902, in the presence of many Indian princes among the representatives of the peoples united under his sway. A contingent of Indian troops, representing almost every part of the great Empire, was conspicuous in the military pageants which accompanied the period of rejoicing. The Indian commemoration of the Coronation took place at Delhi on January 1, 1903, when King Edward VII was proclaimed by the Viceroy as Emperor, on the same site as that on which Lord Lytton had announced the Imperial title of Victoria. Over a hundred rulers of separate States, whose united population amounts to sixty millions of people, from the Arab sheiks of Aden on the west to the Shan chiefs of the Mekong on the borders of China, were assembled to testify their allegiance to their common Sovereign, in the presence of his brother the Duke of Connaught.
There solemnly, through the mouth of his Viceroy, the Emperor renewed to all his feudatories and subjects throughout India the assurance of his regard for their liberties, of his respect for their dignities and rights, and of his devotion to their welfare. In impressive words the Viceroy declared the duties of the officials, the aims of the Government, the needs of the people, and anticipated, under the unchallenged Supremacy of the Paramount Power, an India ‘of expanding industry, of awakened faculties, of increasing prosperity, and of more widely distributed comfort and wealth.’ It was felt that a ceremony of unique grandeur had symbolized the unity of the mightiest Empire of the East.
With this great ceremony, which was happily followed by a considerable reduction of taxation—the first that had been made in India for twenty years—the new reign was inaugurated.