The Sun.
London, England, 1860-05-08 00:00:00

THE INDIGO RIOTS 1N INDIA.

A letter from Calcutta, dated March 31, says,—
These indigo riots threaten consequences so serious
that your readers may be obliged to me for a short
sketch of the causes which have produced them.
Almost the whole of Bengal, as you are aware, is in
the hands of a limited number of landowners,
whose estates vary from 5,000 square miles—the
Dinagepore zemindaree is more than that—to 50.
These zemindars are not, however, landlords in the
English sense, for their tenants are equally with
themselves proprietors. The mass of them cannot
be turned out while they pay their rent. Accord-
ingly, the speculator who wants to grow indigo, in-
stead of buying land and hiring labour, as he would
in Europe, buys the right to these rents. Some-
times he buys out the zemindar altogether. This
has been done in Tirhoot, and, Qwing to this and
some other causes, the European landlords and
their peasantry are in that district in accord. NO

clubmen are employed, and the landowners can
turn out their people to assist the police. In other
cases the planters only hold of the zemindars. This

is the case at Krishnaghur, where the Europeans
own three-fifths of the soil, hut still do not hold di-
rectly of the Crown. The indirect influence of the
zemindar still remains very great. Having no labour
and no land in occupancy, the planter has to induce
the ryots to cultivate their land with the-article he
wants. For half a century his plan for effecting this
end has been to induce his tenantry to take advances.
For every rupee so taken the ryct has to furnish
from four to eight bundles of indigo. The peasant,
from the beginning, never liked the indigo, for two
reasons—it requires minute attention and excessive
exertion in cutting time, and it is a " gambling
crop," i.e. the difference of return in different years
is excessive. Under the advance system the whole
risk is borne by the peasant. If his crop is large he
prospers, but if it is bad his advance debt runs into
the following year, and he has to cultivate next
time without any money at all. Still an advance
of capital without interest was tempting, and while
rice was low the indigo was, on the whole, a fair
cultivation. For the past six years, however, while
the price of rice has been steadily rising, the de-
mand for seeds has been enormously on the increase.
the rate for indigo remained unchanged, and the
peasant therefore found that he was often using his
land to pay off an old debt at a low price per bundle,
while he might have gained a high profit on his
rice or seeds. As a mat ter of course he tried to shirk,
and equally as a matter of course the planter insisted
on his bundles of plant. If he found the ryot obsti-
nate, the planter sowed the land himself, frequently
being attacked by the villagers during the opera-
tion. This is the root of the " club or lattial
system," the planter keeping clubmen to protect
the cultivation. At last„.prices continuing to rise,
the peasantry became more menacing in their
tone, and recently beset the Lieutenant-Governor
with petitions. Mr. Grant replied, stating that
they must work if they contracted to work, but
they could make contracts or not as they liked.
Mr. Eden, magistrate of Baraset, indignant at what
he thought oppression, or, as the planters say, de-
testing the interlopers, circulated a paragraph of
Mr. Grant's letter among the police. Police and
people took it to mean that Government disap-
proved the cultivation of indigo, and a sudden strike
followed. The news spread, and in a few days the
cultivation of indigo had stopped in Krishnaghur,
Moorshedabad, Baraset, and Jesaore. A few fac-
tories, owned directly by Europeans, kept on ; but
the peasantry at once threatened the workmen
with death, and beat them severely as earnest of
their intentions. To put down mutiny among their
own order they moved in large masses with clubs,
and, of course, we all know the danger from an ex-
cited mob. In a few days they commenced menac-
ing the Europeans. In one factory the assistants
were clubbed; in another the stacks were burnt
down ; in a third Mr. Lyons was compelled to call
the crew of a steamer to his aid, and shoot down
five of the mob. In all there was the certainty of
immediate insolvency. If the seed was not sown
by May the crop—a million sterling—would be
lost, and advances of a million sterling more irre-
trievably sacrificed. The planters, therefore, ap-
plied to Government for aid.
In any other contry the civil courts could have
protected both parties. In Bengal, however, the
civil courts are mere devices for delaying justice. It
takes from seven to 15 months to get a suit on the
file. The India-house can produce elaborate tables
showing that the average of delay is five or three
months. Those tables are quite truthful, only the
delay is calculated from the first hearing, which
may be a year after the first application to be heard.
Moreover, the special cases involved were too nu-
merous. Mr. Furlong, for example, agent for a
London company, has 19,000 separate cash con-
tracts out. All the Courts in Bengal could not
settle them in five years, and resort to Government
was unavoidable.

Government was very unwilling to move. The
chief officials said, justly enough, the peasants
would never resist a profitable trade, and an un-
profitable one had better die. Last week, however,
the reports from the magistrates became alarming.
One known to be favourable to the ryots reported
that the outrages revealed gave no adequate idea of
the excitement, and that the peasantry were re-
fusing rent to the' landlords, native as well as
European. At the same time orders arrived from
Lord Canning to stop a jacquerie at all hazards,
and Mr. Wilson represented the folly of allowing a
grand trade to disappear at the mandate of pea-
sants whom the loss of that very trade would im-
poverish. The Government gave way, and on the
24th inst. a bill to preserve indigo contracts was
introduced.

It provides that any man who has received cash
on promise to sow indigo, and does not sow indigo,
si
may be fined five times the advance and imprisoned.
Any man instigating a breach of contract, or spoil-
ingagrowi
alsngco provides f
rop,inay be imprisoned for six
months. It or,a:coremission of in-
quiry to investigate the question, and put plan-
ters and ryots alikeon• oath. This commission
Mr. Yule, the hunting commissioner
o
will comprise a civilian, a planter, a merchant,
native,
and one of the most trusted men
anrdu'haau ngaut
pin India, being, I believe, the civilian. At the same
time, large bodies of military police and irregular
cavalry were ordered into the district to support
the law. The Act expires on the 24th of Septem-
ber, the object being simply to gain time. How
far it will be effectual .we do not yet know. The
belief here is that the ryots will yield. By the last
accounts they are represented as declaring that Go-
vernnient has betrayed them ; that, after ordering
them to discontinue sowing, it imprisons them for
obeying its orders—a remark which, as the expres-
sion of angry feeling, very likely was made. If
they do not yield, the cultivation is at an end, for
all the Acts in the world will not enable half a dozen