§ SIR HENRY WILMOTasked the Secretary of State for India, If he will state on what grounds Lieutenant Colonel Henry Evelyn Coningham, of the Madras Staff Corps, holding the appointment of District Superintendent of Police at Tinnevelly, is precluded from returning to Military duty, and why are no additional allowances granted him. for performing duties in the Police Department, his present allowances in the Police being the unemployed pay of his rank, and nothing more; and, why he is not permitted to draw the same pay as that of officers of his rank in Native Infantry Regiments, viz. 270 rupees a month, in addition to his unemployed pay?
THE MARQUESS OF HARTINGTONSir, Lieutenant Colonel Coningham, after a little more than five years' ser- vice in the Army, joined the police in 1861, and does not appear since that time to have performed regimental duty. It would, therefore, unless the military authorities had special grounds for desiring it, not be expedient to bring back an officer after 20 years' absence from military duty into a regiment in a position suitable to his standing. His present allowances in the police are those allotted to the position to that Service which he has risen in, and these happen to be those of his regimental rank; or, should they be less, he is permitted to draw the full pay of his rank in the Army. The Government of India do not recognize unemployed pay. Lieutenant Colonel Coningham is drawing his full pay. It may be assumed that he entered the police in his own interests, and for the sake of higher salary or other advantage over regimental pay. It would not be for the advantage of the Service either that, on attaining a rank which would now give him an advantage in joining a regiment, he should be allowed to do so to the prejudice of officers who have throughout performed regimental duty with its earlier disadvantages; or that, on the other hand, he should be permitted to place himself out of employment in order to draw his full military pay in idleness. As he draws the full pay of his civil or police appointment, no addition can be made to it.