SOAS Research Online

Abstract

The resumption of rent-free lands in Bengal undertaken by the East India Company in the second quarter of the nineteenth century was the most important revenue measure since the Permanent Settlement. Revenues of nearly a million pounds were in dispute and well over a hundred thousand grants were affected. The resumption proceedings caused much discontent among Bengalis and encouraged the creation of new organisations of landholders and their allies to voice this. Within government the measured also caused controversy, encouraging Utilitarians and Conservatives to propound rival patterns of development for Bengal and its administration. Chapter I reviews rent-free grants under the Mughals and the Company's attitude to them, down to the 1793 settlement. Chapter II traces the progressive abandonment of the 1793 position and the considerations which led to the enactment of Regulation 3 of 1828. Chapter III analyses the arguments about Regulation 3 put forward by the Government of Bengal, the Home Government and the landholders. Chapters IV and V deal with abortive attempts to meet criticism and avoid political disaffection by schemes of compromise with the grant-holders. Chapter VI studies the practical working of resumption. Chapters VII and VIII discuss the agitation against resumption, analysing first the role of the press and then that of the newly formed political associations, and their share in securing the substantial modification of resumption policy.