The Passing of the Pariah Dog.About the time that the cakes or chapátis were being circulated throughout the North-West of India, a common pariah dog was passed from village to village in the Panch Maháls and eastern Gujarát. It was never ascertained who first set the dog in motion, but it came from the Central India frontier with a basket of food which was given to the village dogs, and a similar supply with the dog was forwarded to the next village. When pestilence or other calamity threatens an Indian village, it is the custom to take a goat or a buffalo to the boundary and drive it into the lands of the adjoining village, in the hope that it will avert evil from the community. A similar belief prevailed among the Jews. There is no reason to suppose that this movement of the dog in Gujarát was a signal of revolt or had any deeper political significance than a vague feeling that troublous times were approaching. Still it was by many regarded as an evil omen and created considerable alarm.[1]

Gujarát Disturbances, 1857–1859. Gold Hoarding.Although Gujarát was apparently tranquil in the hot season of 1857, those who were most familiar with native opinion were aware of the existence of very serious discontent, and indications of the storm which lowered on the horizon were not wanting. When disturbances are impending natives invariably convert their savings into gold, because gold is more portable and more easily concealed than silver. A sudden and unusual demand for gold in the markets, especially by the native troops, had been observed. This fall of the political barometer should never be disregarded. It indicates the approach of a storm with great certainty.

Seditious Native Press.The native press, which had been merely disloyal, now assumed an attitude of decided hostility. Every paper contained the most exaggerated accounts of the massacre of Europeans in the North-West Provinces, and absurd rumours were circulated of the approach of a combined Russian and Persian army, which, it was said, had reached Attok and would shortly invade Hindustán. It is much to be regretted that the measures which were found necessary in 1880 for the suppression of seditious publications were not enforced in 1857. Had this been done much evil would have been averted. The native mind would not have become familiar with the spectacle of the British Government held up to the execration and contempt of its subjects and the vilest motives attributed to every public measure.

Maulvi Saráj-ud-din.The native press was not the only source of sedition. The fall of the British Government was openly predicted in every masjid, and in Ahmedábád a Maulvi named Saráj-ud-din became especially prominent by preaching a jehád in the Jáma Masjid to audiences of native officers and savárs of the Gujarát Horse and troops from the
Gujarát Disturbances, 1857–1859. Ahmedábád cantonment. The Maulvi was expelled from Ahmedábád and found his way to Baroda, where he was afterwards arrested; but the impunity he so long enjoyed brought great discredit upon Government, for it was very naturally supposed that a government which tamely submitted to be publicly reviled was too weak to resent the indignity. Oriental races are so accustomed to violent measures that they seldom appreciate moderation or forbearance. The generation that had known and suffered from the anarchy of the Peshwa had passed away. The seditious language of the native press and the masjid was addressed to a population too ignorant to understand the latent power of the British Government.

Apparent Weakness of British Rule.In 1857 the immense continent of Hindustán was governed by what appeared to the people to be a few Englishmen unsupported by troops, for they knew that the native army was not to be depended on, and the European troops were so few that they were only seen in the larger military cantonments. It must have seemed an easy task to dispose of such a handful of men, and it probably never occurred to those who took part in the insurrection that the overthrow of the British Government would involve more serious operations than the capture or murder of the Europeans who governed the country so easily. They could not perceive that England would never submit to a defeat, and that the handful of men who ruled India were supported by the whole power of the nation. The plotters had no very definite ideas for the future. The Musalmáns regarded the subversion of a government of Káfirs as a triumph of Islám, and both Muslims and Hindus looked forward to a period of anarchy during which they might indulge that appetite for plunder which had been restrained for so many years. The descendants of the feudal aristocracy of the Peshwa are an ignorant and improvident race deeply involved in debt. They could not fail to see that under the operation of our laws their estates were rapidly passing into the possession of the more intelligent mercantile classes, and they hoped to recover their position in the revolution that was about to ensue.

Administrative Defects.A great change had taken place in the character of the administration. The civilians of the school of Duncan, Malcolm, and Mountstuart Elphinstone, though not deeply learned in the law, were accomplished earnest men, sufficiently acquainted with the unalterable principles of right and wrong to administer substantial justice to a simple people who had not yet learnt the art of lying. The people asked for justice rather than law. They were satisfied with the justice they obtained from the able and upright men who ruled this country during the first half of this century. The writings and official reports of the officers of that period indicate a knowledge of native customs and feelings and a sympathy with the people that is unknown in the present day, for knowledge and sympathy cannot be acquired except by a long and familiar residence amongst the people which is now becoming every year more impossible. When the overland route rendered communication with England more easy and frequent, a reaction set in against patriarchal administration. Concubinage with native women, which had been common, was now declared vulgar, if not immoral; and the
Gujarát Disturbances, 1857–1859. relations between Europeans and Natives soon became less cordial than they had been during the early period of British rule. About this time a considerable immigration of lawyers appeared in India. The Courts Disliked.These briefless gentlemen, envious of the official monopoly of the Civil Service, raised an outcry that justice was being administered by men who had not acquired that knowledge of law which the formality of eating a certain number of dinners at the Temple was supposed to guarantee. They worked the press so industriously to this cry, that in the course of a few years they had succeeded in impressing their views on the Court of Directors in London and on the less intelligent members of the Civil Service in India.

Unfortunately the Sadar Court was then presided over by a succession of feeble old gentlemen who had not sufficient force of character to resist this selfish agitation, and by way of refuting the charge of ignorance of law devoted themselves to the study of those petty technicalities which have so often brought the administration of justice into contempt, and which the progress of law reform has not even now removed from the law of England. In 1827, Mountstuart Elphinstone had enacted a Civil and Criminal Code which was still the substantive law of the land. It was simple and admirably suited to the people, but justice was administered according to the spirit rather than the letter of the law. A district officer would have incurred severe censure if his decisions were found to be inequitable, however they might have been supported by the letter of the law. The national character for even-handed justice had made the English name respected throughout India and far across the steppes of Central Asia. But the demoralizing example of the Sadar Adálat soon extended to the lower grades of the service. The Civil Service was afflicted with the foolishness which, we are told, precedes ruin. Its members diligently searched their law-books for precedents and cases, and rejoiced exceedingly if they could show their knowledge of law by reversing the decision of a lower Court on some long-forgotten ruling of the Courts of Westminster. The first effect of this evil was to fill the courts with corrupt and unprincipled vakils who perverted the course of justice by perjury, forgery, and fraud of every description. Litigation increased enormously, no cause was too rotten, no claim too fraudulent to deprive it of the chance of success. The grossest injustice was committed in the name of the law, and though the Civil Service was above all suspicion of corruption, the evil could hardly have been greater if the Judges had been corrupt. This state of affairs gave rise to great discontent, for the administration of justice fell almost entirely into the hands of the vakils. When men quarrelled they no longer said, “I’ll beat or I’ll kill you,” but “I’ll pay a vakil Rs. 50 to ruin you,” and too often this was no mere idle threat.

The Inám Commission.The operations of the Inám Commission and of the Survey Department were also a fruitful cause of alarm and discontent. Many of the estates of the more influential Jághírdárs had been acquired by fraud or violence during the period of anarchy which preceded the fall of the Peshwa. The Patels and Deshmukhs had also appropriated large areas of lands and had made grants of villages to temples and assignments of revenue to Bráhmans, religious mendicants, and dancing
Gujarát Disturbances, 1857–1859.
The Inám Commission. girls. The Peshwa had never recognized these alienations as any limitation of his rights, for he farmed his revenues, and so long as a large sum was paid into his treasury by the farmers it was immaterial to him how much land was alienated. But when the Survey Department revealed the fact that nearly a fourth part of the fertile province of Gujarát was unauthorizedly enjoyed by these parasites; and that in other districts the proportion of alienations was nearly equally large, a due regard for the public interests demanded that there should be an investigation into the title on which the lands were held rent-free. It became the duty of the Inám Commission to make this inquiry, and though a very small portion of land was resumed or rather assessed to the land revenue and the rules for the continuation of cash allowances were extremely liberal, they could hardly be expected to give satisfaction to those who had so long enjoyed immunity from any share of the public burdens. The Bráhmans and the priesthood of every sect deeply resented the scrutiny of the Inám Commission and excited an intensely fanatical spirit by representing the inquiry as a sacrilegious attack on their religious endowments and a departure from the principle of neutrality and toleration which had been the policy of Government from a very early period.

The Army Disloyal.Notwithstanding all these elements of danger there would probably have been no revolt if the army had remained loyal. Fortunately the Bombay army was composed of a great variety of races, Musalmáns of the Shia and Sunni sects, Maráthás of the Dakhan and Konkan, Parváris, Pardeshis, and a few Jews and Christians. Little community of sentiment could exist, in so heterogeneous a force, and to this circumstance we may trace the failure of each mutinous outbreak in the regiments of the Bombay army. Many of its regiments had, however, recruited extensively in the North-West Provinces which were then the centre of the political cyclone, and it was soon discovered that seditious overtures were being made to them not only by their brethren in the regiments which had already mutinied, but by discontented persons of higher rank. Báiza Bái of Gwálior.The most important of these was a clever woman known as the Báiza Bái. She was the daughter of a Dakhan Sardár named Sirji Ráo Ghátke, and had been married in early life to His Highness Dowlat Ráo Sindia the Mahárája of Gwálior. On his death she had been allowed to adopt Jankoji Ráo as heir to the gádi, and during his minority she had been appointed by the British Government Regent of the Gwálior state. In this position the Bái had accumulated great wealth. She had deposited £370,000 (37 lákhs of rupees) for safe custody in the treasury at Benares, and it was known that she had other resources at Gwálior. Her avarice and ambition were insatiable. She sent emissaries to all the Marátha chiefs and Thákors in Western India calling on them to take up arms and restore the empire of Shiváji. She appealed to the troops, urging them to emulate the deeds of their comrades in the Bengal army who had already nearly exterminated the Europeans in the North-West, and warned them that if they did not now strike in defence of their religion they would shortly be converted to Christianity and made to drink the blood of the sacred cow.

Pársi Riot in Broach, June 1857.In May and June 1857 our troops were fighting before Delhi, only just holding their own, and making little impression on the walls
Gujarát Disturbances, 1857–1859.
Pársi Riot in Broach, June 1857. of the city which were strongly held by the mutinous regiments. Gujarát was still tranquil. It is true there had been a riot in Broach originating in a long-standing feud between the Pársis and Musalmáns of that town, but it had no political significance and had been promptly suppressed. The ringleaders were arrested, tried, and sentenced to be hanged for the murder of a Pársi, but there is no reason to suppose that this disturbance had any immediate connection with the outbreak in the North-West. It was probably only a coincidence, but the violence of the rioters was no doubt encouraged by the weakness of our position in Gujarát, and the exaggerated rumours which reached them of the massacre of our countrymen.