Nathaniel Brassey Halhed - A Code of Gentoo Laws

A Code of Gentoo Laws

A few months before Halhed's appointment as writer, the court of directors notified the President and council at Fort William College of their determination to take over the administration of civil justice and the execution of the policy to be left with the newly appointed Governor, Warren Hastings. Hastings assumed governorship in April, 1772 and by August submitted what was to become the Judicial Plan of 1772. The plan provided among other things that "all suits regarding the inheritance, marriage, caste and other religious usages, or institutions, the laws of the Koran with respect to Mohametans and those of the Shaster with respect to Gentoos shall be invariably adhered to."

Although the plan was simple it was beset with difficulties since there was no Englishman who could read Sanskrit and very few Indians who could. The prospect of employing the scholars or pundits as judges was also ruled out since the pundits were interpreters of the Sanskrit texts and, therefore, were not aided by any particular code to provide sound justice. Thus, the cumbersome job of translation was undertaken and ten pundits were hired to which an eleventh was added. Hastings was particularly diligent about it since he envisaged making a text in English that contained the native laws to prove that India was not in a savage state as was mistakenly believed and that its laws, though not as sophisticated as English laws, were able enough in their native region of enforcement. Hastings could not trust the authorities in England, not even the well-wishers, since they had not set foot in India and had no idea of the ways of the country. He found it necessary to show the authorities that it was far prudent to apply the native laws on their subjects rather than laws that would be alien to them.

To this effect the pundits began to assimilate a text from various sources which they named Vivadarnavasetu or the sea of litigations. The subsequent translation to Persian, a language Halhed and Hastings was well acquainted with, was done via a Bengali oral version by Zaid ud-Din 'Ali Rasa'i. Halhed translated the Persian text to English closely attended by Hastings himself. The complete translation was in Hastings' hands on 27 March 1775. At his request the East India Company had it printed in London in 1776 in a handsome quarto under the title of A Code of Gentoo Laws, or, Ordinations of the Pundits. This was a private edition, copies of which were not for sale, but was distributed by the East India Company. A pirated and less luxurious edition in octavo was printed by Donaldson the following year followed by a second edition in 1781 and translations in French and German appeared as early as 1778.

The book sold successfully and made Halhed famous. However, the publication of the book brought not just praise but also strong criticism against the native laws and more importantly the authenticity of the text since it was generally agreed that a translation of the third degree would be highly erroneous and misleading from the original. The code, however, failed to become the authoritative text of the Anglo-Indian judicial system. Its impact was greater in Europe and the Continent than in India and a literary success more due to Halhed's preface and the introduction to Sanskrit than the laws themselves. A review in the London based Critical Review on September 1777 stated:

"This is a most sublime performance ... we are persuaded that even this enlightened quarter of the globe cannot boast anything which soars so completely above the narrow, vulgar sphere of prejudice and priestcraft. The most amiable part of modern philosophy is hardly upon a level with the extensive charity, the comprehensive benevolence, of a few rude untutored Hindoo Bramins ... Mr. Halhed has rendered more real service to this country, to the world in general, by this performance, than ever flowed from all the wealth of all the nabobs by whom the country of these poor people has been plundered ... Wealth is not the only, nor the most valuable commodity, which Britain might import from India."