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C

COURTS FOR THE PROVINCES.

subject to the said presidency, in like manner and subject to all the regulations, provisions, and confirmations, touching the same, as the governor-general in council at Fort William aforesaid are, by any act now in force, authorized and empowered to do for the better administration of justice among the native inhabitants, and others, being within the provinces of Bengal, Bahar, and Orissa.

Towns of Madras and Bombay.

(2) Subject to appeal; governors in council at Madras and Bombay to make regulations for the good order of those towns and dependencies.

(3) Copies of regulations abroad, made under 37 Geo. III, cap. 142; 39 and 40 Geo. III, cap. 79; and 47 Geo. III, sess. 2, cap. 68, to be laid annually with accounts before Parliament.

LAWS.

1807.

47 Geo. 3,

c. 68, § 3.

$ 1.

1813.

53 Geo. 3,
c. 155,
$ 66.

DEBTS OF THE COMPANY IN INDIA AND

ENGLAND.

REGISTERED INDIA AND BOND DEBTS.

THE few observations under this head will be confined to the "Register Debt in India;" by which is meant the sum raised by loans for the public service in that country, including the balance of the fund reserved for the payment of the private debts of the late Nabobs of the Carnatic: and to the home or Bond debt of the Company in England.

REGISTER DEBT IN INDIA.

The registered debt in India is of two descriptions, viz.
Remittable paper, and
Non-remittable paper.

The former, or remittable debt, consists chiefly of the loan opened in February 1822, and closed in June of that year. It amounts to between seven and eight crore. Interest at the rate of six per cent. is payable to subscribers in India, and the same to holders bonâ fide resident in Europe, at their option, by bills on the Court of Directors at 2s. 1d. the sicca rupee, and twelve months after date. The principal of the loan is not to be paid off during the existing charter; and when that measure shall be carried into effect, the proprietors are to have the option of being paid either in India or in England, at 2s. 6d. the sicca rupee.

In addition to the debt of 1822, is a temporary debt of rupees 33,14,960 (thirty-three lacs fourteen thousand nine hundred and sixty), which was renewed for seven years from December 1818. It was arranged, that at the expiration of the seven years, the principal of the debt should be discharged by annual payments of one-fifth, either in cash in India, or by bills on England at 2s. 6d. the sicca rupee, at the option of the holder.

THE

REGISTERED INDIA AND BOND DEBT.

THE NON-REMITTABLE DEBT

Originally consisted of loans raised at various periods, which were consolidated with the loan of 1811, and subsequently transferred into the loan of March 1822. More than four lacs of this transfer were discharged under the arrangements concluded in February 1823. The remainder (with the exception of twenty-seven lacs, ordered for payment) was carried to the loan of the 31st March 1823, which loan amounted to Rupees 9,04,11,000 (nine crore four lacs eleven thousand). The conditions provide that it shall bear an interest of five per cent., payable in India: proprietors resident in Europe, have hitherto been permitted by the Court of Directors to receive their interest in England by bills at 2s. 1d. the sicca rupee. No part of that loan is to be advertised for payment before the 31st March 1825, and after that date to no greater extent than a crore and a half per annum.

In September 1824, a loan at four per cent., with the option of receiving the interest in England at 2s. the sicca rupee, was opened at Calcutta: the subscriptions to that loan amounted to Rupees 1,57,00,000 (one crore fifty-seven lacs.)

A loan was subsequently opened in May 1825 at five per cent., on terms similar to that of September 1824; and the holders of the four per cent. loan were to have the priority, by being allowed to transfer their subscriptions from that to the new loan, provided they submitted a sum in cash equal to the amount of transfer.

To the foregoing debts in Bengal is to be added that of two crore to the King of Oude, the loan of the first crore having been effected in 1815; the interest on which at six per cent. is payable in pensions; and the loan for the second crore in 1825 at five per cent. .

The debt at Madras consists chiefly of the balance of the Carnatic fund, the amount of which, together with the registered debt on the 30th April 1824, was Madras Rupees 1,58,33,684.

The trifling registered debt at Bombay was in 1823 transferred to the Bengal loan of 1822.

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REGISTERED INDIA AND BOND DEBT.

The total registered debt of India may be taken at about twenty-eight millions sterling.

The interest on the Indian debt is payable out of the territorial revenues, after the charges and expenses of raising and maintaining the forces, as well European, as native, military, artillery and marine on the several establishments in India.

For such portion of interest of the debt as may be payable in England, provision is to be made by consignments or remittances to England, as the Court of Directors, with the approbation of the Board of Commissioners, shall from time to time direct.

The following table will shew the medium rates at which money has been borrowed by the governments in India, from 1792-3 to 1823-4.

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From 1812-13 to 1822-23, the average rate of interest has been

six per cent.; and in 1823-24, six and five per cent.

BOND

REGISTERED INDIA AND BOND DEBT.

BOND DEBT.

By the act of the 9th and 10th Wm. III, the Company cannot borrow money on their common seal for a less period than six months. This provision was introduced to preserve the interests of the Bank of England then newly incorporated. The first limit to the extent of the Company's borrowing on their bonds was made by the 7th of Queen Anne, fixing the total at £1,500,000. By the 7th Geo. I, the same was extended to £5,000,000, and by the 17th Geo. II, to £6,000,000. Under the regulating act of 1773, the bond debt was to be reduced to £1,500,000, to which amount the Company have at various times been required by Parliament to reduce it. In 1793, the Company were permitted to increase their capital stock, upon condition that the bond debt, then £3,200,000, was reduced to £1,500,000; after which, by consent of the Board of Commissioners for the Affairs of India, obtained in writing, it might be increased in the sum of £500,000. This was the first legislative provision giving the Board authority to interfere with regard to the Company's bond debt. In 1794, it was permitted to be increased to £3,000,000.

The Company not having availed themselves of the permission granted them in 1797, to increase their capital stock from six to eight millions, an act was passed in 1807 to allow the bond debt to be increased to £5,000,000. In 1811, in order to meet the bills drawn upon the Court of Directors from India, on account of the territorial and political expenses incurred in India, the Company were authorized, with the consent of the Board of Commissioners, to increase the bond debt to £7,000,000, beyond which no further sum is to be raised on bond-legal effect was likewise given by that act to the transfer of the property in such bonds from one person to another. By the act of 1813, the limit to which the bond debt is to be reduced is fixed at £3,000,000.

The interest on the bonds has been as follows:

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