§ MR. A. C. MORTONI beg to ask the Secretary of State for India whether his attention has been drawn to His Excellency the Governor General of India in Council's Despatch, dated 27th February, 1889, forwarding to the Secretary of State for India the Memorial of Bhai Jasmair Singh, of Kythal and Arnowli, in which it is stated that it was against the Orders contained in Despatch, No. 12, Political, dated 28th March, 1849, in Paragraphs 9–11, of which the honourable Court of Directors expressed their approval of the Orders passed by the Government of India in this case, and against the refusal of the Government to re-consider them that the Memorialist was appealing; and will he explain why, during a long period passed in appealing to the various authorities in India, the Memorialist was never informed of the existence of this Despatch of the honourable Court of Directors?
§ MR. H. H. FOWLERI have seen the letter from the Government of India of 27th February, 1889, and the correspondence on the subject which passed between the India Office and gentlemen interested in the claimant at the beginning of this year. I am unwilling to speak positively about the details of what took place in 1849. It appears, however, that the Despatch of the Court of Directors of the 28th March, 1849, was not a decision on an appeal from the claimant which would necessarily be communicated to him, but a confirmation of Orders passed in 1847 by the Government of India, and communicated to the 361 parties interested, and acted on in that year. These Orders were valid from the date of their issue, and there was apparently no reason why the parties interested should have been informed of the correspondence with the Home Government.