White Paper on Indian States (1950)/Part 1/Lord Hastings' Settlements; Policy of Subordinate Isolation

by Ministry of States, Government of India

Lord Hastings' Settlements: Policy of Subordinate Isolation

4. In the second phase which lasted from 1813 to 1857, larger schemes of Empire dawned upon the horizon and dominated the policy of the Company's agents. The march of events in India was leading up to an inevitable swing of the pendulum in the direction of the emergence of the British as the dominant power in India. It was no longer part of prudence to refrain from expansionist or imperial projects. The feudatory system, which may be distinguished from the protected alliance, came into existence with the changed conditions which, after the elimination of the Maharatta power, placed the Company in a position of unquestioned supremacy in India. The considerations underlying the new policy were set out by Metcalfe, one of the principal architects of the British Empire in India, in a letter written in 1816. The passage runs:

"They said that some power in India had always existed, to which the peacable States submitted, and in return obtained protection against the invasion of upstart Chiefs and the armies of lawless banditti; that the British Government now occupied the place of that protecting power and was the natural guardian of weak States........."

5. The policy of "the ringfence" now gave way to what Lee Warner describes as the policy of "subordinate isolation". From now onwards the place of treaties of mutual amity, friendly co-operation and reciprocal obligations was taken by treaties exhorting co-operation, allegiance and loyalty.

6. The new policy found its expression in the settlements made by the Marquis of Hastings under which the Princes virtually assumed the form in which they were found at the end of British rule in India. By the end of 1819 all States were caught in the wide net of treaties and engagements of subordinate co-operation. The protection guaranteed to the Princes by the British stabilised their position and the surviving States were saved from further disintegration or absorption.