The Pensioner

In this the last chapter of his memoirs Sita Ram covers some old ground, inveighs against the corruption of minor Indian officials, and complains of the changed attitude of British officers towards sepoys like himself. He also included some allegations against the Mahommedans but these I have omitted. India is now a secular state and there is nothing to be gained by reviving old quarrels that do no good to either side.

He does not like the new Army with its preponderance of Punjabis, considering them to be hairy and uncouth, nor is he enamoured of the new-style British officers who seem to have suffered from all the arrogance of youth. He prefers the easy-going officers of the old days, with their hookahs and interminable curry dinners, whose morals may have been questionable but who, in Sita Ram's opinion, understood India better than the new generation. Conditions could not have been easy for a Hindustani sepoy in the years immediately following the Mutiny. Memories such as the massacre of the women and children at Cawnpore died hard and repression was a more popular word than clemency. Those sepoys who had remained loyal were probably made to feel responsible for the sins of those who had mutinied.

The old Subedar has a lot to say about bribery, which was not confined to India either then or since, but India has always been a very poor country, where the margin between ease and poverty is pathetically small, and in such circumstances bribery and corruption are probably inevitable. Office of any kind under the Government was regarded as an excellent opportunity for feathering one's nest, or at least for acquiring some degree of comfort for one's family, and bribery was certainly not confined to civilian officials. Sita Ram has already told us of the trouble he had as a recruit for failing to reward his Drill Havildar and European Sergeant when he completed his recruit training.

He complains a good deal about the administration of justice and it must be remembered that Indians are among the most litigious people on this earth. There is nothing an Indian peasant enjoys more than a long-drawn-out lawsuit in which he will argue his case with more heat than skill. However, it is true that the new laws introduced by the British when they annexed Oudh bore little resemblance to traditional Hindu justice, and were utterly incomprehensible to the older generation who naturally preferred the old ways.

It is unfortunate that Sita Ram's account of his long life in the service of the Sirkar should end on rather a sour note but we must make allowances for the fact that the aftermath of the Mutiny was a particularly unhappy period in Indian history. However, in his concluding sentences, Sita Ram expresses contentment with his lot and asks to be remembered as a faithful servant of the English Government.

After my return from my second campaign in Nepal, fought this time not against the Nepalese but against those men with whom the Sirkar had formerly defeated the Nepalese, I was promoted to Subedar after forty-eight years of hard wear and tear in the Sirkar's service. I entered the army under the flag of the Company Bahadur, and I ended under the flag of the Empress of the World.¹ I was an old man of sixty-five years of age and had attained the highest rank to be gained in the Native Army,² but I would have been much better fitted for this position thirty years earlier. What could I do now at the head of my Company? How could I double-march, or perform Light Infantry drill? But I was expected to be as active as ever and no allowance was made for my forty-eight years' service. No one bothered to remember that I had carried a musket for thirty years and had been present in as many battles as most of the officers had lived years. I was shouted at by the Adjutant as if I was a bullock, and he a mere boy, young enough to be my grandson. I was abused by the Commanding Officer, and called a fool, a donkey, and an old woman! Finally I was taken before the Commander-in-Chief and reported on as being utterly useless—a man the Commanding Officer could do nothing with.

I was taken before the Invaliding Committee which agreed my discharge, and I acquired the pension of a Subedar. Had any attention been paid to my rights, I should have received this pension years before. I wanted this pension more than anything else in the world and yet I did not like to ask for it; and when I was, as it were, discharged compulsorily, of course I was not pleased. I do not doubt that the Company Bahadur would have wished me to have my pension earlier and the delay was not the Company's fault. It was due to the new hard regulations. The time it took to become a Subedar was far too long for most sepoys to aspire to, for this promotion was seldom given until after forty years' service. In recent years some men have become Jemadars and Subedars more quickly, and many of them were immediately promoted if they brought young men for enlistment during the Mutiny. This is a much better system. These officers were men of influence and were much more highly regarded by the sepoys, being looked upon as fathers of the company. But if the Sirkar wants men of rank and position, the pay of sixty-seven rupees a month is hardly likely to tempt them.³ The native officers of the Irregular Cavalry are generally men of some wealth, and the younger sons of good families, but then their pay is good and this enables them to keep up their position.⁴

Those native officers who became Jemadars and Subedars at once did good service during the Mutiny and led their men well. They were young and full of spirit. However, once the fighting was finished, they were found not to know their drill so well as a sepoy, who had spent forty years at it and was therefore much too old to perform it. They were bullied, questioned, examined, and drilled until they became quite sick of the service, and numbers of them left in disgust as they had nothing more to look for in the way of advancement. Some were sent away with gifts of land which no-one else had cultivated. The ordinary sepoy would be quite contented with a larger pension, and if he could obtain this after twenty-five years' service, he would not worry over becoming a Subedar. He could only achieve this rank when he was too old to be fit for it, unable to march, and at a time when he ought to have been at home taking his ease and preparing for death.

Our learned men had told us that the Company's rule would come to an end in 1857, since this was one hundred years after the Company's first great battle,⁵ but they did not tell us that another kind of English rule would take its place. This rule was far harder and much harsher. The Company Bahadur and its officers were much kinder to the people of India than the present Government. If it were not for the old servants of the Company, it would be even worse than it is. In my last regiment there were five or six young sahibs who came to us from some European regiment. Several of these commanded companies but it was obvious that they hated the sepoys. They always spoke severely and sneeringly to us. In my opinion this is not calculated to endear them to the sepoys. Very few of these officers could speak to the men, and when they did so it was in unpleasant fashion. They may have learned how to command European soldiers but they did not know how to command sepoys. My Lord, sepoys will not fight well for those they do not like, or for a Government which is not kind to them. They used to be treated kindly, but then they turned against their master. They will never find as good a master again.

The Mahommedans were the first instigators of the Mutiny, and the Hindus followed like a flock of sheep over the bank of a river.⁶ The principal cause of the rebellion was the feeling of power that the sepoys had, and the little control the sahibs were allowed to exert over them. Naturally, they assumed from this that the Sirkar must be afraid of them, whereas it only trusted them too well. But a son is not discarded by a parent for once rebelling against his authority, and I trust that the chastisement meted out to the rebellious son for this Mutiny will have a lasting effect, and that wickedness will never again be permitted to enter into the hearts of the sepoys. It is obvious that all officers are now afraid to trust the sepoy, and this must be so for many years to come, but it is unjust to condemn everyone. There were some who remained faithful, and there were still more whose fate it was to be in a regiment that mutinied. These had no desire to rebel against the Sirkar, but feared that no allowance would be made for them when so many others had gone wrong. This was well understood by those who instigated the Mutiny. Their first object was to implicate an entire regiment so that everyone had to throw in their lot with them. All regiments took their Colours with them. They did not break their oath by deserting them.⁷ They left the service of the English and were supposed to have entered the service of another government.

I know the sahibs. Nothing pleases them more than a straight answer to a plain question but the Indian does not usually understand this. He will always try to answer a question in such a fashion as will please the asker—exactly the answer he imagines the asker desires. I never could feel myself again, nor hold my head as high as formerly, after the death of my son. The fact that he had fought against the giver of his salt brought great disgrace upon me. My chief solace today is thinking over the many years of my service, during which I was never punished, except for the single instance I have already mentioned. I have given my entire life to the service of the Sirkar. I have one son left, by whom I send your Lordship my papers, and I have two daughters who are married and have large families.

I have not acquired any fortune but I have my paternal estate and the pension of a Subedar. This is enough for me. The people in my village seem to respect me, and are now fully satisfied with the ease and benefits they enjoy under English rule. The man who sows now knows that he will reap, which he never could reckon on doing in the old days.

The people are still sometimes oppressed by the subordinate Indian officials but redress can often be obtained, and in any case this oppression gets less and less each year. If the District Commissioner sahib goes about himself and personally inquires into all complaints, as our good sahib does (may his office last for ever!) and takes an interest in our welfare, there will be little inclination to resist the Sirkar's authority. But if everything is left to the Indian officials, as is sometimes done through the inability of the sahib to understand what is said to him, the people become dissatisfied, talk against the government and long for a change. My Lord, the Indian officials are all corrupt, whether they be Hindus or Mahommedans; in this respect there is no difference between them. There may be one man who would not take a bribe of five rupees, but I have never yet heard of him. The principal reason for this is the poor pay provided by the Sirkar, but if it was only half as much, there would still be hundreds of applicants who would make up by bribes what was deficient in their wages. This was always the case in former times—the man who could give the biggest bribe would always win his case. 'When there are those who are willing to receive, there will be found those who will give; and when there are those who will give, it is not difficult to find those who will take.'⁸ The sahibs have tried to put down bribery but there is such a combination against them that they will never be successful.

A British official is always very angry when he learns that a petitioner has given a bribe. He asks him why he did it. Perhaps he does not know that the man firmly believes that part of the bribe went to the sahib himself! Therefore he does not dare to say anything, because all the officials have told him this, from the office runner to the head clerk. I have never yet heard of an office where the petty clerks did not make out somehow or other that the sahib was amenable to a bribe. Since they live by bribes themselves, it is of course in their interest to maintain the system. The head Patwari⁹ in my village told me one day that it must have been my own fault that promotion was so slow in coming. When I replied that I had never done anything wrong, he laughed and said I was not wise, even though I had been so much in the world. He meant of course that I had not paid for my promotion, thinking that promotion could be bought like everything else. I have known very few cases of English officers taking bribes. I have been told that many did, but I have never believed it since I know their personal honour is very strict. However I have seen no difference where bribery is concerned between the Indian and the European soldier of subordinate rank. I know the sahibs do not take bribes but I also know that many much better educated than I am firmly believe that the sahibs do so. Since this is part of their own nature, how can they believe anything different?

I remember I once had occasion to go to the Deputy Commissioner's office on some petty business of my own. I was in Hindustani dress and imagined I could walk straight in, as I had been told it was an open court of justice. Immediately two or three chaprassis came to me to know what my business was. I told them it was with the sahib, not with them. They then said it was very difficult to see the sahib for he was engaged, and a hundred other excuses were invented. They ended by telling me that one of them would take the petition himself and lay it before the Commissioner if I gave him five rupees. I answered that I had no petition. I was then prevented from entering the sahib's presence for a long time and only because I would not produce a bribe. At last a head clerk came out and spoke to me. He told me the sahib's temper was very bad that day, but if I particularly wished to see him, some other official would dare to brave his wrath by mentioning the fact to him, but this would cost me ten rupees.

Tiring of these attempts at extortion, and also not believing the man's story, I entered the office, but the chaprassis and clerks did their best to prevent me. They all began talking against me, saying 'what a mannerless person I was to intrude in such fashion', and they spoke out loudly in order to attract the sahib's attention. I walked straight up to him, gave him a military salute, and requested permission to speak but he ordered me to be thrown out and also abused me. The office runners tried to throw me out but I would not allow them to touch me. Since the sahib himself had ordered me to leave, I went outside, after giving him my name, regiment, and rank. One of the chaprassis who had first accosted me then trumped up a case that I had resisted authority. The entire office swore that I had beaten the man dreadfully. He showed his face all covered with blood, which he must have had ready for the purpose, as I only pushed away those who were attempting to lay hands on me. I was fined ten rupees for resisting authority. When I returned to my regiment I reported the whole case, just as it had occurred, to my Commanding Officer. He was very angry and wrote about it but I never received any redress for this great insult. If a District Commissioner sahib is easy of access, and will take the trouble to listen to the complaints of the poor, bribery can in large measure be prevented. The subordinate officials will then be afraid that the sahib will hear the rights of the case and the people will then realize that there is no use offering bribes.

The Sirkar's punishments for offences are considered by many to be absurd. A low-caste man is convicted of breaking into a house and stealing jewels from the women, attended by violence. He is sent to prison for a year where he is much better fed, clothed, and looked after than he has ever been in his life. It is true that he has lost his liberty but he gets his food and laughs at the hard labour. What is hard labour to a coolie who has to work so hard for his few ounces of flour? His hand would have been chopped off under a native government. This is real punishment and one the thief would never forget. It is a punishment that has great effect upon all evil-doers, and this I conceive to be the purpose of punishment. The Sirkar should remember that the peasant is only a bullock. A bullock does not mind being beaten with a small stick. He requires a goad, and so it is with these criminals. The Sirkar's punishments have no effect on them. They are in fact a perfect laughing stock.

The laws of the English are doubtless very wise and good for the English but the laws of the Hindu code are the best for us. We much prefer them. They are written in a language which can be understood, but few Hindus can understand the English laws which are all written in Arabic. I have often asked learned men why our laws cannot be written in a language we understand and they have told me their meaning cannot be given in Hindi. It would seem to me that crimes which cannot be described in a people's tongue do not need any laws to lay down the punishments. Who can understand why a man should not punish his wife if she is guilty of adultery? Can money satisfy his desire for revenge? Yet we are not now permitted to punish either the wife or her paramour. This is not justice and leads to great dissatisfaction. There can only be one opinion of this.

I have now written all I can remember of interest in my life, and I have given my opinion on many subjects. I should never have thought of doing this but for your Lordship's desire that I should so do. If I have said anything unseemly, my Lord must grant me a pardon. But what I have said is true—I have fired at no mice with cannon.¹⁰ I meet very few sahibs in my own village but sometimes the District Commissioner is pleased to listen to my story. I go twice a year into cantonments to receive my pension and I then have a gossip about the old days. However, there are few of the old sahibs left now, and the new sahibs do not much want to listen to an old man's babbling of things and events which took place before they were born. Thanks be to God the Creator! I lack nothing thanks to the bounty of the Sirkar, and I have a son still left to perform my funeral ceremonies.¹¹ If your Lordship, when you return to your own country, will always remember that the old Subedar Sita Ram was a true and faithful servant of the English Government, it will be enough for me. And now, with profound respect for one who has always been to me as a father, I make my most humble obeisance!