Part 18 – Indian Legal History – Lord Hastings Plan 1814 –

Part 18 – Indian Legal History – Lord Hastings Plan 1814 –



Reality Views by sm –
Sunday, June 06, 2010

As we have seen that increasing number of suits increased the work load of courts and in result, increase in number of pending suits.

To reduce the accumulation of cases and suits a plan was introduced of referring land disputes to arbitration.
Regulation VI of 1813 made provisions to this effect.
Land disputed parties were free to take their matters to private arbitration and courts were to support and enforce the awards made by the arbitration.

Lord Hastings - Plan of 1814 -

Increased the court fees, started to charge the fees on every process undertaken and on every paper filed in the civil courts.
This way judiciary became the revenue and money making factory as on every paper, judicial process the fee was charged.

The effect was that people started to keep away from the judiciary as it became costly affair.

Regulation V increased the strength of each provincial court to four.

Regulation XXVI tried to restrict the number of appeals. Only one appeal was allowed in every case.

This regulation laid down the qualification for the appointment of registers and district judges.

The persons who wanted to became register have to obtain the certificate from the Collage of Fort William.

From 1st February, 1815 no person was to be appointed a judge of provincial court unless he had at least 3 years of experience as a judge or magistrate in a district adalat.

Bengal Presidency 1814
The structure of Judiciary in Bengal Presidency 1814 –

We will start from the Bottom –

1. Munsiffs - jurisdiction up to Rs.64
2. Munsiff location - District
3. Appeals from munsiffs went to the district diwani adalat
4. Sadar ammens tried the cased up to Rs. 150
5. Sadar ammens located at district head quarters
6. Appeals went to Diwani adalat.
7. Registers tried cases up to Rs. 500
8. Appeals went to the District diwani adalat
9. Each Diwani adalat had one or two registers
10. One diwani adalat in each district
11. Diwani adalat tried cases up to Rs. 5000
12. Appeals went to the Provincial Court of appeal
13. Provincial court of appeal tried cases over Rs. 5000

In 1793 District Diwani adalat enjoyed unlimited power but in 1814 District diwani adalat got limited power , tried cases up to Rs. 5000 only .