CHAPTER XIII
THE PURIFYING OF BENGAL
When Clive quitted England for Bengal (June 4, 1764) he knew only that the war with Mír Kásim was raging, and that Mír Jafar had been reinstated in his position. It was not until he reached Madras, the 10th of April following, that he learned that Mír Kásim had been finally defeated, that his followers had submitted, that Mír Jafar was dead, and that the Nawáb-Wazír of Oudh had thrown himself on the clemency of the English. In the interval of twenty-three days which elapsed before his arrival in Calcutta (May 3), he had time, in consultation with the two members of the Select Committee who accompanied him, Messrs. Sykes and Sumner, to deliberate regarding the course of action which it would behove him to adopt on his arrival there.1
1 The other two were General Carnac and Mr. Verelst.
One of his first acts on arrival was to remodel the army. He placed General Carnac at its head, divided the European infantry into three battalions, gave regimental commands to two officers who had accompanied him from England, and regulated all the superior appointments in a manner the best adapted, in his opinion, to secure efficiency.
He dealt likewise with the Civil Service. Nothing had impressed Clive more than the evil effects of the predominance of venality and corruption during the rule which had followed his first departure, and he was resolved to put them down with a strong hand. He found, on his landing, a subject which gave him the opportunity he desired for showing publicly the bent of the line of conduct he intended to pursue.
Four months before his return, Mír Jafar, worn out by anxiety and trouble, had passed away. His position had become degraded, even in his own eyes. From having been, as he was on the morrow of Plassey, the lord of three rich provinces, he had become, to use the words of a contemporary Englishman,2 'a banker for the Company's servants, who could draw upon him as often and to as great an amount as they pleased.'
2 Mr. Scrafton. See Scrafton's Letters.
We have seen how the members of Council had benefited pecuniarily by the elevation of Mír Jafar to the masnad in 1757; by that of his successor in 1763; by Mír Jafar's re-elevation the same year. The opportunity of again selecting a successor was not to be passed over without their once again plunging their hands in the treasury of Murshidábád. They found that there were two candidates for the vacant office, the son of Míran, and therefore grandson of Mír Jafar, and the eldest surviving son of that Nawáb. The decision arrived at by the Council, then reduced by vacancies to eight members, was to sell the succession to the candidate who should bid the highest price for it. They decided in favour of the son of Mír Jafar, for, although illegitimate, he was of an age at which he could act on his own authority; the other was a minor, whose revenues would have to be accounted for. In return for their complaisance, it was agreed that they should receive a sum of money, to be divided as they might arrange, close upon ten lakhs of rupees; in addition, there was to be paid another sum, just over ten lakhs, for secret services rendered by one of their number, Mr. Gideon Johnstone, and by a Muhammadan, Muhammad Ríza Khán, who also, in pursuance of the arrangement, was nominated Deputy-Nawáb. This shameful bargain was signed, sealed, and delivered on the 25th of February, little more than two months before Lord Clive landed.