The Sun.
London, England, 1841-08-23 00:00:00

THE RAJA OF SATTARA,, AND
TREATMENT OF HIS AGENTS BY THE DI-
RECTORS OF TIEIE EAST INDIA COMPANY.

In The Sun of the 23c1 July, we deemed.' it our duty
to direct public attention to the systemetic ill faith and
oppression, the trumped up charges to colour this op-
pression, the wicked-condemnation that followed
the scandalous personal treatment, ending in the death
upon the high-road of the Raja's dearest friend and re-
lative, of which this much injured Prince and his family
have been made the victims by the Government of Bom-
bay. We stated that the five days' debate at the India
:House elicited proof of the fact, that a majority of, the
Court of Directors have bestowed " THEIR ViAliM COM-
MENDATION" upon all these acts, even upon the act of
secretly accusing the Raja of treason, sending a Com-
mission to his capital, without a word of announce-
ment, to try him behind his back, and positively, and
by express order, forbidding a human being to be
present on his . behalf, to cross-examine witnesses
who confessed to deliberate perjury, or even to
take a note of the evidence I This; in the deliberate
commendation of the Court of Directors,is their justice
and international law. The subsequent midnight seizure
of the Raja and his sleeping family, like the most atro-
cious of malefactors, their forcible deportation to Benares,
and the confiscation of the whole of his private property,
down to his flocks and herds—all acknowledged by three
Political Residents at his Court to have been the Ra-
ja's own, as absolutely as any thing that belongs to any
one of these Directors—is a further exposition of their
justice and their law. Aye, they get up in their Court,
the Court of ProprieterS, and take God to witness they
do justice to the nations of India, high and low, rich and
poor, -Raja and Rvot, according to the solemn.oath they
have sworn. And they produce and print their sane-r-
-tien, their epproval,- and their confirmation of such con.;
tact and such sets as these, as evidence of the sanctity
with which they regard that oath. One thing they
Make quite thanifeatieetheir intimate conviction that their
willing audienee are 4Haves or fools. .`;
Death Wry i-fatettays to one of flee -vies
tires from the treatment he received —•." A noble fellow
exclaimed' General LodWiek when he spoke.. o£ end
described that. -Victim, th4emtbrtunate Balla Sahib. The
British public is'little aware that a similar tragedy was
on the point of being rehearsed before their eyes, in
this city, as was aeteden the road to Benares ; the victim
in this case, too, another friend of the Raja's,- one of his
vakeels or agents; of whom he deputed many
months since to Eng,land, to solicit in vain from the Court
of Directors all 'that he has .ever asked from his perse-
cutors in India orin England—a hearing ; and who would
,
have fallen a Pray to sickness, wrought by distress of
mind, and to absolute 'Want, if a generous hand,
" Open as 'day to Melting charity," •
had not interposed its aid, and by immediately minister-
ing that relief to the necessities of the sufferer, which
the Court of DirectorS sternly and peremptorily denied
to his respectful prayer, rescued him from being borne to
a pauper's grave in a foreign land.
The agent in question, the first whom the Raja de-
puted, was a -Mahomedan, of talent and education, named
MeerAfeal-Ali, who, having been in England some years
previous, was-sent before, to prepare the way in a man-
ner, for the •-coming of three other persons, all
Ilindoos, . subjects of Sattara, who. were intimately
acquainted with the Raja's affairs, two of them having
long been his secretaries,- and the other a relatiVe.- As
those individuals had never before quitted Sattara in
their lives, hardly' knew aught beyond its wails, nor
understood a word of English, they needed all the aid
.and guidance which the experience of their colleague
could give them,• in directing their course in the very
novel world to which they were to be transplanted, by
their sense of duty and personal attachment to (their
sovereign. Meer Ali, duly accredited, arrived in Eng-
land in December, 1838; When, as he states to the
Court of Directors (Sept. 1,1, 1840), "in consequence
of assurances that Sir James Curiae would amicably
adjust all the existing differences " with the Raja, he
refrained from addressing the Court. At the time he
was-silenced by these assurances, the Court were in pos-
session of the folios upon folios of evidence, which have
been raked and piled up against the Raja—a glance at
the nature of which sufficed to make the future Gover-
ner, Sir James Carnac, declare, that he undertook to
settle the - affair with the Raja. in five minutes.
In June, 1839, arrived two of the Hindoos,
with their numerous attendants. And here •we shall
detail the treatment which these agents, not British sub-
jects, bat men of birth, rank, post, and-consideration,
the subjects of a reigning Prince, not merely guiltless
of crime or offence, but who were clothed by him with a
character held
.sacred even by barbarians, received at
the hands of the Governor in Council, when, on leaving
.Sattara, they reached Bombay as the first stage in their
mission to England. The Raja had distinctly told the
late Governor, Sir R. Grant, of his intention to appeal to
England e he made so little mystery of it that the 'Re-
sident had no difficulty in hearing of the steps he was
taking, nor in learning the names of all the personi who
had consented to undertake an errand to them so ardhous
and perilous, for the Resident first communicated their
'names and purpose to the Government in November.
?Eg-ee'd'ajtoiteinteillgencerceusjitered. e_ The Governor in
Council, coneisting. then of _three individuals, all Com-
- prow s all or whom had repeatedly adjudged
solemn
eevmenry conclave.shad of they.llll:
to
him
ly
with and without date, extending from the 12 Ca February
recordeditetldtatj oa b'aelnvgealtriiileittt)iy. of minutes, and parts of minutes,
to 19th March, 18.39, their opinion that—
" With 3.1 (a Frenchman), we have nothing to say,
but with the natives we have a great deal, and we should
interfere to stop them."

" As a deputation from the Raja proceeding without
the consent of this Government, I should think these
persons could be stopped."
" If the li).Ja applies to send such an embassy, ;ye may
refer the application to the Honourable Court, and await
the Honourable Court's orders."
• " The Raja of'Suttara can . send no deputation except
through the authorized channel, and no such deputation
has been authorized.

" The grounds on which these persons are supposed
to be proceeding to Europe from the Baja of Sattara,
should be reported, and their names stated.
" The Governor-General and Secret Committee to be
informed." .

" The reference to the Senior Magistrate of Police
should be made regarding these natives, and the Advo-
cate-General may be consulted, as to whether we can
detain them on any Information we possess, as depUted
by the Raja of Sattara."
" The Senior Magistrate .should hand up the state-
ment' of each individual, which, it is presumed, he took
in writing.".
" Colonel Ovans's letter, of the•lSth instant, and the
result of the examinations taken by Mr. Boyd, leave no
doubt regarding the nature and objects of the mission
about to proceed to England on the part of the Raja of
Sattara.' . .

. . .
" Mr. Boyd should inform the principal persons, that
Government are satisfied that, proceeding as they do
without the sanction of this Government, they will find
themselves mistaken in the expectation that they will be
recognized in any public capacity by her Majesty's Go-
vernment or the Honourable Court of Directors.
" The Advocate-General may also be informed of this •
,Hon, in case he has any objection to offer to it. • 1
Copies of all papers connected with the subject
should be sent to the Secret Committee, with cur earnest .
recommendation, that the mission may not, on its arrival
in England, be recognised, either by the Court or, by
her Majesty's Government. Their instructions may also
be aolicited, whether such mission should be allowed, or
not, to proceed to. England.
" The Secret Committee will determine whether this
proceeding is in conformity. with the Raja's agreement
with Government."
But these minutes, so creditable to the writers, and so
worthy of the occasion, do not, however, reveal the
whole story. The agents, fearing to embark in an '
English ship, had secured. their passage in a French ves-
sel,
the G. envier, then on the eve of sailing for Por-
deaux. Orders were issued to stop this ship and refuse.
her a port clearance. . The. agents were seized in their
house by the police, carried before the senior magis-
trate, who first detained them as charged with a crimi-
nal
offence, next severely interrogated them upon a string
of questions, which had been suggested by the Adt-ocate-
General, for the express purpose,of frightening afounding
foundin them. - The same: Governor in Council, be it
men, ari
peremptorilyan denied legal advice to the
letlfor their lives, repudiated
:Itiae.tn b7e There d,
poor had
heir character of agents to the Raja, and declared them-
selves to bd no longer ,envoys but private merchants ;
whereupon the magnanimous Government branded
them as liars and impostors e and although the
supercargo of the French ship attended at the
Police office, and repeatedly offered to give
bond that they should ' not communicate with
the shore, as the ship passed down the coast, his offer
was rejected, he was compelled. to sail without them,
and they were made to forfeit the whole of the sum they
had paid for their passege... Three weeks after, they
were released by another solemn minute front further
Sat tara, they
rleeeaevpintigon and treat-
detention, and told they might now embark for England
at their own risk, and on paying a second time fur their
11.)e:1as-felt ge ed.
Liverpool.A b nt nine
li
NI-I,z tth st
haefitre r
ment has been since their arrival in England, we shall
describe in the words of a Director, General Robertson,
who was personally acquainted-with these native gentle-
men, when he was British Resident at the Court of
their master. The General, turning to and addressing
his colleague e, the Directors, said, " had these men been
thieves and robbers, they could not have been treated
worse. ' I know not what right • there is to treat the
natives of India in this way. They had not bread to
eat. I myself was obliged to give them money to keep
them from starving !" "The earnest -recommendation
of the Boinba-e Council was thus fulfilled even beyond
the letter. riot only , was " thee mission not recog-
nised by the Court ' (and such a mission, the
mission of a Prince secretly accused, and `afterwards vio-
lently-deposed!), but the persona .eomposini
it were re-
garded in the light of " thieves and robbers." Then came
physical want, to aggravate their, bitter mental suffer-
ings. The confiscation of their master's private pro-
perty left them with no other pecuniary resources than
thew they had brought with 'theca. These they bus-
' biedea for many months, with the frugality known only
to the limited personal wants of the natives of the East,
feeding their
,minds with the vain hope that the accents

deci
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