MR. BUXTONasked the Secretary of State for India, with reference to his despatch to the Government of India of November 4, 1880, on the failure of the Estimates for the war in Afghanistan, If he can state whether responsibility rests on any Indian officials besides those mentioned as having already resigned, viz.: Lord Lytton and the Military and Financial Members of the Indian Council; whether he has yet been able to rectify "the peculiarity of the procedure for the record of Indian Military Accounts," by which the Indian Government, as late as March 2, 1880, underestimated the cost of the war by the sum of £9,000,000, and, in their Budget of that date, declined a loan and remitted taxation; whether the Indian Government did not discover by the end of March, after an inquiry lasting only a few days, how erroneous were their Estimates of the war; and, what steps he proposes to take to prevent the recurrence of such errors?
THE MARQUESS OF HARTINGTONThe Report which the despatch of November 4, 1880, referred to as expected from the Government of India, in accordance with the promise given in their letter of the 1st of June, as to the responsibility which, in their view, attached to the officers by whom the system of Military Accounts had been administered, has not yet been received. The late Government of India explained that the error arose from the Estimate of expenditure for the war having been based on the amount brought to record in the Audited Accounts, instead of the amount issued from the Treasuries for military purposes. Orders have been given that in future the issues for military and other services shall in the Accounts be treated as expenditure. The Government of India discovered in March that their cash balances would be lower than was anticipated; but they did not then know the extent of the error which had been committed. On the 8th of April, the Viceroy reported that the outgoings for the war were far in excess of the Estimate. On the 4th of 49 May the Government wrote that the aggregate net disbursements to the Military Department since the beginning of the operations had so far exceeded the normal payments to that Department as to suggest strong doubts of the correctness of its Estimates of the cost of the war. Instructions have been given for alterations in the system of account, and in regard to the duties to be assigned respectively to the Comptroller General and the Military Accountant General, as well as for the preparation of a Report by the former officer explaining any important variations between the Accounts and the Estimates. I have no objection to the hon. Member having, as an unopposed Return, a copy of the Report of the Committee appointed by the Secretary of State for India to inquire into the system of Military Account and Estimate in India, together with the evidence given before that Committee, and of the Orders of the Secretary of State on that Report.