The Bombay City Police: A Historical Sketch, 1672-1916

by S. M. Edwardes

The actual details of Tod’s police administration are obscure. At the outset he was apparently hampered by lack of funds, for which the Bombay Government had made no provision. On January 17th, 1780, he submitted to them an account of sums which he had advanced and expended in pursuance of his duties as executive head of the police, and also informed the Council that twenty-four constables, “who had been sworn in for the villages without the gates”, had received no pay and consequently had, in concert with the Bhandaris, been exacting heavy fees from the inhabitants. Tod requested the Government to pay the wages due to these men, or, failing that, to authorize payment by a general assessment on all heads of families residing outside the gates of the town. The Council reimbursed Tod’s expenses and issued orders for an assessment to meet the cost of the constabulary.

While allowing for the many difficulties confronting him, Tod cannot be held to have achieved much success as head of the police. His old critics, the Grand Jury, returned to the charge at the Sessions which opened on April 30th, 1787, and protested in strong terms against “the yet inefficient state of every branch of the Police, which required immediate and effectual amendment”. “That part of it” they said, “which had for its object the personal security of the inhabitants and their property was not sufficiently vigorous to prevent the frequent repetition of murder, felony, and every other species of atrociousness—defects that had often been the subject of complaint from the Grand Jury of Bombay, but never with more reason than at that Sessions, as the number of prisoners for various offences bore ample testimony.”

They animadverted on the want of proper regulations, on the great difficulty of obtaining menial servants and the still greater difficulty of retaining them in their service, on the enormous wages which they demanded and their generally dubious characters. So far as concerned the domestic servant problem, the Bombay public at the close of the eighteenth century seems to have been in a position closely resembling that of the middle-classes in England at the close of the Great War (1914-18). The Grand Jury complained also of the defective state of the high roads, of the uncleanliness of many streets in the Town, and of “the filthiness of some of the inhabitants, being uncommonly offensive and a real nuisance to society”. They objected to the obstruction caused by the piling of cotton on the Green and in the streets, to the enormous price of the necessaries of life, the bad state of the markets, and the high rates of labour. They urged the Justices to press the Bombay Government for reform and suggested “the appointment of a Committee of Police with full powers to frame regulations and armed with sufficient authority to carry them into execution, as had already been done with happy effect on the representation of the Grand Juries at the other Presidencies.”

The serious increase of robbery and “nightly depredations” was ascribed chiefly to the fact that all persons were allowed to enter Bombay freely, without examination, and that the streets were infested with beggars “calling themselves Faquiers and Jogees (Fakirs and Jogis)”, who exacted contributions from the public. The beggar-nuisance is one of the chief problems requiring solution in the modern City of Bombay: and it may be some consolation to a harassed Commissioner of Police to know that his predecessor of the eighteenth century was faced with similar difficulties. The Grand Jury were not over-squeamish in their recommendations on the subject. They advocated the immediate deportation of all persons having no visible means of subsistence, and as a result the police, presumably under Tod’s orders, sent thirteen suspicious persons out of the Island.[27]

Three years later, in 1790, Tod’s administration came to a disastrous close. He was tried for corruption. “The principal witness against him (as must always happen)”, wrote Sir James Mackintosh, “was his native receiver of bribes. He expatiated on the danger to all Englishmen of convicting them on such testimony; but in spite of a topic which, by declaring all black agents incredible, would render all white villains secure, he was convicted; though—too lenient a judgment—he was only reprimanded and suffered to resign his station”.[28] Sir James Mackintosh, as is clear from his report of October, 1811, to the Bombay Government, was stoutly opposed to the system of granting the chief executive police officer wide judicial powers, such as those exercised by Tod and his immediate successors: and his hostility to the system may have led to his overlooking the exceptional difficulties and temptations to which Tod was exposed. The Governor and his three Councillors, in whom by Act XXIV, Geo. III, of 1785 (“for the better regulation and management of the affairs of the East India Company and for establishing a Court of Judicature”), the supreme judicial and executive administration of Bombay were at this date vested, realized perhaps that Tod’s emoluments of Rs. 250 a month were scarcely large enough to secure the integrity of an official vested with such wide powers over a community, whose moral standards were admittedly low, that Tod had done a certain amount of good work under difficult conditions, and that the very nature of his office was bound to create him many enemies. On these considerations they may have deemed it right to temper justice with mercy and to permit the delinquent to resign his appointment in lieu of being dismissed.

The identity of Tod’s immediate successor is unknown. Whoever he was, he seems to have effected no amelioration of existing conditions. In 1793 the Grand Jury again drew pointed attention to “the total inadequacy of the police arrangements for the preservation of the peace and the prevention of crimes, and for bringing criminals to justice.” Bombay was the scene of constant robberies by armed gangs, none of whom were apprehended. The close of the eighteenth century was a period of chaos and internecine warfare throughout a large part of India, and it is only natural that Bombay should have suffered to some extent from the inroads of marauders, tempted by the prospect of loot. A system of night-patrols, weak in numbers and poorly paid, could not grapple effectively with organized gangs of free-booters, nurtured on dangerous enterprises and accustomed to great rapidity of movement. The complaints of the Grand Jury, however, could not be overlooked, and led directly to the appointment of a committee to consider the whole subject of the police administration and suggest reform.

This committee was in the midst of its enquiry when Act XXXIII, Geo. III. of 1793 was promulgated and rendered further investigation unnecessary. Under that Act a Commission of the Peace, based upon the form adopted in England, was issued for each Presidency by the Supreme Court of Judicature in Bengal. The Governor and his Councillors remained ex officiis Justices of the Peace for the Island, and five additional Justices were appointed by the Governor-General-in-Council on the recommendation of the Bombay Government. The Commission of the Peace further provided for the abolition of the office of Deputy of Police and High Constable, and created in its place the office of Superintendent of Police.

The first Superintendent of Police was Mr. Simon Halliday, who just prior to the promulgation of the Act above-mentioned had been nominated by the Justices to the office of High Constable. So much appears from the records of the Court of Sessions; and one may presume that after the Act came into operation in 1793 Mr. Halliday’s title was altered to that of Superintendent. His powers were somewhat curtailed to accord with the powers vested in the Superintendent of Police at Calcutta, and he was bound to keep the Governor-in-Council regularly informed of all action taken by him in his official capacity.

Mr. Halliday was in charge of the office of Superintendent of Police until 1808. His assumption of office synchronized with a thorough revision of the arrangements for policing the area outside the Fort, which up to that date had proved wholly ineffective. Under the new system, which is stated in Warden’s Report to have been introduced in 1793 and was approved by the Justices a little later, the troublesome area known as “Dungree and the Woods” was split up into 14 police divisions, each division being staffed by 2 Constables (European) and a varying number of Peons (not exceeding 130 for the whole area), who were to be stationary in their respective charges and responsible for dealing with all illegal acts committed within their limits.