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Bureaucracy and Control in India's Great Landed Estates: The Raj Darbhanga of Bihar, 1879 to 1950

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 November 2008

Stephen Henningham
Stephen Henningham
Affiliation:
University of Melbourne
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Extract

In north India in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries several great landed estates played a crucial part in the consolidation of imperial rule and in the support of the social and economic order. These estates have attracted considerable scholarly attention, but previous research has concentrated primarily on their relations with the colonial administraton and on their general intermediary role in north Indian society. The only study directly concerned with their internal affairs is Dr. P. J. Musgrave's ‘Landlords and Lords of the Land: Estate Management and Social Control in Uttar Pradesh 1860–1920’ (Modern Asian Studies, 6, 3 (1972), pp. 257–75), in which official sources are used as the basis for an account of the internal operations of the great estates in the United Provinces of Agra and Oudh. Hitherto the major obstacle to the examination of the administration of the great estates has been the absence of comprehensive estate records. Fortunately the extensive and well-organized archives of the Raj Darbhanga of Bihar recently have been opened to scholars. In this paper the Raj archives have been drawn upon to provide evidence for an account of the structure and operation of the administration of the Raj Darbhanga during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The paper argues that despite substantial difficulties the Raj Darbhanga effectively pursued its interests by means of a bureaucratic system of management and that therefore Dr Musgrave's conclusions concerning the limited power of the great landed estates need substantial qualification and correction.

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Articles
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Modern Asian Studies , Volume 17 , Issue 1 , February 1983 , pp. 35 - 57
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1983

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References

I am grateful to Dr Lance Brennan, and to the participants in a South Asia conference held at the Australian National University in Fcburary 1981, for their helpful comments on an earlier version of this paper.

The following abbreviations are used: AAR Annual Administrative Report; C Collection; f File; F Fasli; G General Department, Raj Darbhanga Archives; L Law Department, Raj Darbhanga; RDA Raj Darbhanga Archives.

1 See also Metcalf, Thomas R., Land, Landlords and the British Raj. Northern India in the Nineteenth Century (University of California: Berkeley, 1979), Chs 9 and 10.Google Scholar Professor Metcalf employs official sources, interviews and fragmentary estate and family records as the basis for comments on the internal affairs of the great landed estates of the United Provinces. However, he is mainly concerned with the activities of the great landlords themselves and their relations with the British administration rather than the management and control in the estates. Thus the chapters most relevant to the present paper are entitled ‘Taluqdars as Estate Managers’ and ‘Landlords and Local Government’. For remarks on estate management in a Bengal district, based on the author's recollections, see Raychaudhuri's, Tapan ‘Permanent Settlement in Operation: Bakarganj District, East Bengal’ in Frykenberg, Robert Eric (ed.), Land Control and Social Structure in Indian History (University of Wisconsin: Madison, 1969), pp. 163–74, (169–72).Google Scholar

2 For Professor Metcalf's comments on the limited availability and chaotic state of estate records in the United Provinces see Landlords and the Raj, p. 426.Google Scholar See also his ‘Estate Management and Estate Records in Oudh’, Indian Economic and Social History Review, 4, 2 (1967), pp. 99–108.CrossRefGoogle Scholar The Raj Darbhanga archives came under state control and were opened for research in 1975. For details of their contents see the appendix to my ‘Agrarian Relations in North Bihar: Peasant Protest and the Darbhanga Raj, 1919–20’, Indian Economic and Social History Review (01–03 1979).Google Scholar

3 O'Malley, L. S. S., Bengal District Gazetteers: Darbhanga (Government of Bengal: Calcutta, 1907), p. 145Google Scholar; Report on the Administration of the Darbhanga Raj, 1914–15, C XXXIV, G 1915–16; Secretary of State for India, Indian Statutory Commission (India Office, London, 12 volumes, 1930), 12, p. 393.Google Scholar

4 O'Malley, L. S. S., Bengal District Gazetteers: Champaran (Government of Bengal: Calcutta, 1907), pp. 151–2.Google Scholar

5 For the Balrampur Raj see Nevill, H. R., District Gazetteers of the United Provinces of Agra and Oudh: Bahraich and Gonda (Government of the United Provinces: Allahabad, 1903, and Naini Tal, 1905)Google Scholar; Metcalf, Landlords and Raj; Sen, Gertrude Emersen, Voiceless India (rev. edn Benares, , 1946).Google Scholar For the Burdwan Raj see Peterson, J. C. K., Bengal District Gazetteers: Burdwan (Government of Bengal: Calcutta, 1910)Google Scholar; O'Malley, L. S. S. and Chakravarti, Monmohan, Bengal District Gazetteers: Hooghly (Government of Bengal: Calcutta, 1912)Google Scholar; Ray, Ratnalekha, Change in Bengal Agrarian Society (Manohar: New Delhi, 1979).Google Scholar

6 ‘Partition, Agitation and Congress: Bengal 1904 to 1908’, in Gallagher, John, Johnson, Gordon and Seal, Anil (eds), Locality, Province and Nation. Essays on Indian Politics, 1870–1940 (Cambridge University Press: London, 1973), pp. 213–68, p. 217.Google Scholar

7 Bihar Land System, p. 8, Land Reform Files, f 227, 1947, Jay Prakash Narayan Papers, Nehru Memorial Library. See also Kerr, J. H., Final Report on the Survey and Settlement Operations in the Darbhanga District, 1896 to 1903 (Government of Bihar and Orissa: Patna, 1926), pp. 79, 105.Google Scholar

8 Hagen, James R. and Yang, Anand A., ‘Local Sources for the Study of Rural India: The “Village Notes” of Bihar’, The Indian Economic and Social History Review, XIII, 1 (1976), pp. 75–84, p. 78.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

9 O'Malley, L. S. S., Bengal District Gazetteers: Saran (Government of Bengal: Calcutta, 1908), p. 120.Google Scholar See also O'Malley, L. S. S., Bengal District Gazetteers: Monghyr (Government of Bengal; Calcutta, 1909), p. 159.Google Scholar

10 See, for example, Singh, Shyam Narayan, History of Tirhut from the Earliest Times to the End of the Nineteenth Century (Baptist Mission Press: Calcutta, 1922), pp. 232–3.Google Scholar

11 Burn, J., Report on the Administration of the Durbhunga Estates, 1860–79, Government of Bengal Land Revenue Proceedings 49–53, August 1880; Major R. C. Money, Durbhanga Raj Manager to Patna Commissioner, 10 March 1877, and S. C. Bayley, Patna Commissioner to Board of Revenue, 13 March 1877, Government of Bengal Land Revenue Proceedings 29–33, April 1877; Extracts from the Annual Report of the Officiating Manager of the Durbhanga Estate for 1876–77, Government of Bengal Land Revenue Proceedings 48–49, May 1878.Google Scholar

12 See the Raj Darbhanga Directory, 1941 (Raj Press, Darbhanga, 1941).Google Scholar

13 See the Law Department holdings, RDA.

14 Chief Manager's Note on Retrenchment Committee Report, p. 4, f 10G, C Management, G 1937–38.Google Scholar

15 Interview, Jageshwar Mishra, Darbhanga town, 23 September 1976.Google Scholar

16 Interview, Umarpathi Tewari, Dumari village, Darbhanga, 17 October 1976.Google Scholar

17 16D39, C Management, G. 1941–42 RDA.

18 Letter 9, Parihar AAR, C XXXIV, G 1919–20 RDA.

19 Priyanath Banurje, Report on the Administration of the Durbhanga Raj for 1322F—1914/15, C XXXIV, G 1915–16.

20 16A21, C Management, G 1939–40.

21 Hayaghat AAR 1346 F, 16D2, G 1939–40.

22 Naredigar AAR 1348 F, G 1941–42.

23 Naredigar AAR 1322 F, C XXXIV, G 1915–16.

24 3B, C Darkhasht, G 1921–22.

25 Ibid.

26 Diary 23 March 1923, f 43A, C XXV, G 1922–23.Google Scholar

27 Ibid.

28 3K, C Darkhasht, G 1921–22; Alapur AAR 1326 F, C XXXIV, G 1919–20.

29 Sunder, D., Confidential Notes, 22 January 1920, f 14Z24, C XXVI, G 1919–20.Google Scholar

30 Padri AAR 1347 F, 16D1, G 1941–42. Consider also the Gondwara Manager's comments on the ‘Urgent need to improve status and position of Patwaries who in fact carry on main business of Zamindari. My experience of them in this circle has been most discouraging. … Lots of instances of their vagaries and Mischiefs may be quoted.’ Gondwara AAR 1348 F, 16D3, G 1942–43.

31 Hayaghat Manager's Report, 8 April 1922, f3M, Darkhasht, G 1921–22.Google Scholar

32 Ibid.

33 Memorandum, 25 August 1939, f 16D27, C Management, G 1941–42.Google Scholar

34 Bhawanipore AAR 1322 F, f2, C XXXIV, G 1915–16.

35 Chief Manager, Note on discussion on administration of Purnea circles, 24 April 1941, 16D7, C Management, G 1941–42.Google Scholar

36 Naredigar AAR 1318 F, f 16D3, G 1941–42.

37 Alapur AAR 1326 F, f 2, C XXXIV, G 1919–20.

38 Chief Manager's Note on Retrenchment Committee Report, f 10G, C Head Office, G 1937–38.

39 Dain, quoted in the Report on the Land Revenue Administration of the Province of Bihar and Orissa for 1932–33 (Government of Bihar and Orissa: Patna, 1934), p. 20.Google Scholar

40 16Dz, C Jhanjharpur, G 1941–42.

41 See my ‘Peasant Protest and the Darbhanga Raj’ and Peasant Movements in Colonial India. North Bihar, 1917–1942 (A.N.U., South Asia Monograph, Canberra, 1982), Ch. 6.Google Scholar

42 Parihar Manager to Chief Manager, 26 February 1939, 14 Cl, C Head Office, G 1939–40.Google Scholar

43 Naredigar Manager to Law Superintendent, 8 August 1921, f 10–0, C V, L 1920–21.Google Scholar

44 Alapur Manager's Diary 7 and 17 November 1922, Letter 24, C XXV, G 1922–23.Google Scholar

45 Alapur Manager to Law Mukhtear, Madhubani, f 56C, C Alapur, L 1940–41.

46 Alapur Manager to Chief Manager, 11 November 1940, f 56C, C Alapur, L 1940–41.Google Scholar

47 Padri AAR 1349 F, 16D3, G 1942–43.

48 Parihar AAR 1349 F, f 16D2, 1942–43.

49 Nishankpur AAR 1349 F, f 16D1, G 1942–43.

50 See my Peasant Movements, Ch. 1, and see Siddiqi, Majid Hayat, Agrarian Unrest in North India. The United Provinces 1918–22 (Vikas: New Delhi, 1978), Chs 1 and 2.Google Scholar

51 A copy of the map of the Awa estate, dated Allahabad, 9 March 1877, is bound in with the Court of Wards’ Reports, North-Western Provinces, for 1874/75–1881/82 (Government of the North-Western Provinces: Allahabad, 1875–1983), held in the Victoria State Library.Google Scholar See also the District Gazetteers of the United Provinces of Agra and Oudh (Government of the United Provinces: Allahabad, 1905–1911)Google Scholar for Agra (author: H. R. Nevill), p. 89;Google ScholarAligarh (author: H. R. Nevill), p. 102;Google ScholarEtah (author: Neave, E. R.), pp. 88–92;Google ScholarMainpuri (author: Neave, E. R.); and Muttra (author: Drake-Brockman, D. L.), p. 128.Google Scholar Note that in the 1870s the district jurisdictions were changed as follows: the Jaleswar pargana was transferred from Muttra to Agra in 1874, and in 1879 all of this pargana except for 46 villages was transferred to Etah. See Nevill, , Agra, pp. 103, 285.Google Scholar On the question of dispersal it is noteworthy that later in his article (pp. 267–8) Musgrave refers to the estate of the Raja of Mahmudabad, which comprised 613 villages, 539 of them in the single district of Sitapur, thus forming a ‘central cluster of villages’.

52 Nevill, H. R., District Gazetteers of the United Provinces of Agra and Oudh: Ganda, Bahraich, Basti, Fyzabad, Sultanpur and Bara Banki (Government of the United Provinces: Allahabad, Naini Tal, 1903–1907).Google Scholar

53 The difficulties created by dispersal and distance could be increased when the ownership of a village was divided between landlords. However, at least in the Raj Darbhanga it seems that the problems of joint-proprietorship generally could be remedied. The scarcity and brevity of reference in the Raj records to such problems indicate they were an annoyance rather than a major concern.

54 See my ‘Peasant Protest and the Darbhanga Raj’.

55 Musgrave ‘Landlords and Lords of the Land’, pp. 267–8;Google ScholarMetcalf, , Landlords and Raj, p. 251.Google Scholar

56 Yang, Anand A., ‘An Institutional Shelter: The Court of Wards in Late Nineteenth-Century Bihar’, Modern Asian Studies, 13, 2 (1979), pp. 247–64.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

57 Report of the Court of Wards, North-Western Provinces and Oudh, for the Revenue Year 1891–92 (Government of the United Provinces: Allahabad, 1893), p. 9.Google Scholar

58 See the annual Court of Wards' reports.

59 For details of these estates see Report of the Court of Wards, North-Western Provinces, for the Revenue Years 1874–75 ana 1883–84 (Government of the United Provinces: Allahabad, 1876, 1885)Google Scholar and Report of the Court of Wards, North-Western Provinces and Oudh, for Revenue Years ending 30 September 1901, 1903 and 1915 (Government of the United Provinces: Allahabad, 1902, 1904 and 1916).Google Scholar

60 Nevill, , Gonda, p. 81. Musgrave (p. 267) points out that in the Balrampur Raj the thikadars had established themselves on a hereditary basis.Google Scholar

61 No figures are available either on the total number of bureaucratically managed estates or on the area they covered. However, Siddiqi's analysis indicates that only a small proportion of the acreage of the United Provinces was under either thikadari leases or under proprietary control. It seems probable, therefore, that most of the great landlords ran their estates by more or less bureaucratic systems of managements, though of course the effectiveness of these systems probably varied greatly. See Siddiqi, Agrarian Unrest, Ch. 1, and particularly fig. 1, p. 37, and fig. 4, p. 42.Google Scholar

62 Around 1950 the long history of conflict between the village élites and the great landed estates of north India culminated with the abolition of the zamindari and associated systems of landholding. Neither the Raj Darbhanga nor the other landed estates could survive unchanged in the face of heightened political awareness, mass suffrage, and a populist movement and party—the Indian National Congress—committed to mild measures of land reform. Nonetheless the Raj Darbhanga fought a stout rearguard action which did not lose momentum until the death of Maharaja Kameshwar Singh in 1962. Indeed the ‘Raj interest’ endures today as a force in the politics and society of north Bihar. In doing so it acts as a testament to an estate which effectively managed its affairs and controlled its tenants throughout the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. On the fortunes of the landlords of the United Provinces in the post-independence era, see Metcalf, Thomas R., ‘Landlords without Land: the U.P. Zamindars Today’, Pacific Affairs, XL, 1 and 2 (Spring and Summer 1967).Google Scholar Metcalf concludes that the landlords ‘… are still very much a power to be reckoned with …’.