Warren Hastings
Topic: Europeans in India and the Rise of Company Rule · NCERT: Beyond NCERT
Meaning
Warren Hastings was the first Governor-General of Bengal (1773–1785). He held this post under the Regulating Act of 1773, the British Parliament's first law to control the East India Company. As Governor of Bengal from 1772, he ended the "dual government". Under that system the Company collected the revenue while the Nawab's officials ran the administration. He also moved the treasury from Murshidabad to Calcutta. He fought the Marathas and Mysore, and he supported Indian learning through the Calcutta Madrasa and the Asiatic Society. He matters because the Company began to act as a real government under him, and no longer only as a trader.
Example
In 1781 Hastings founded the Calcutta Madrasa to teach Persian, Arabic and Islamic law. He also wrote the introduction to Charles Wilkins' English translation of the Bhagavad Gita (1785). After he returned to England, Parliament put him on trial (impeachment) for misrule. The trial lasted from 1788 to 1795, and he was finally acquitted.
Don't confuse with
- Lord Hastings (Francis Rawdon-Hastings): a different man. He was Governor-General from 1813 to 1823 and is known for the Third Anglo-Maratha War.
- First Governor-General of India: this was William Bentinck in 1833, not Warren Hastings. Warren Hastings was Governor-General of Bengal only.
Related concepts
- Charles Metcalfe
- Regulating Act 1773
- Supreme Court at Calcutta 1774
- Pitt's India Act 1784
- Impeachment of Warren Hastings
- Cornwallis Code 1793
- Charter Act 1793
- Covenanted civil service
- Fort William College
- Haileybury College