THE RAJAH OF SATTARA. (Hansard, 7 February 1843)

§ Mr. Hume

rose to move the following return, of which he had given notice:— Copy of the additional papers transmitted to the Court of Directors, in relation to the Commission of Inquiry held at Sattara, in October, 1836, and ordered by a General Court of Proprietors of the East India Company, held in Leadenhall-street, the 21st day of December, 1842, and printed for the use of the proprietors. It was not his intention on the present occasion to enter into the case narrowly; it was one, however, which had attracted a great deal of notice, and was every day increasing in interest and importance, among the Indian public. He had during the last three years moved for papers explanatory of the proceedings against the Rajah, and the treatment he had received. Since the last Session, when the last papers were produced, a variety of new matter, previously unknown had been brought forward; he then held in his hand a paper published by the India House, for the information of the proprietors, containing statements given in by the Rajah on the 26th of August, 1839, wherein he requests an inquiry into the matters it contained. These papers had been most unaccountably kept back by Colonel Ovans, the resident at the court of the Rajah, and were only 237 now sent over in consequence of a debate at the India House, in which the Colonel's conduct was impugned. They had, also, a variety of documents which would be rendered useless if they had not all the original documents. Whatever these documents might prove—whether they might be in favour of or against the Rajah, it was but right, when he was deposed and his territories taken from him, that they should be laid before the House. He had intimated his intention to move for a Committee, in order that her Majesty's Government might direct a commission to be sent to India to institute an inquiry into this complicated subject. The Governor of Bombay, Sir George Arthur, gave his opinion that justice could not be done unless further inquiry were made. Whether that inquiry should take place in this country or in India, was a matter of opinion; but he (Mr. Hume) would prefer that the Commission was appoined in India, to hear the Rajah in the face of his accuser. He was the descendant of the, he might call them, original Mahrattas, and he was deprived of his territories without a trial. Public opinion in India was unsettled on the subject, nor would it be otherwise till a full trial took place. No native chief could be satisfied while the Rajah of Sattara was deprived of his territory on such grounds as those alleged. He (Mr. Hume) was only an advocate for inquiry—he believed the Rajah to be innocent. At a future period of the Session he would state to the House his opinion as to the best mode of doing justice to the Rajah; at present he only wished for the documents.