Page:A General Biography of Bengal Celebrities Vol 1.djvu/128

 HIS CAREER AS A CIVIL SERVANT AND HIS DIFFICULTIES. 119 his son's success. He was on his death-bed while the telegraphic news was on its way. He died on Sunday the 20th February; the bereaved family heard the news of his re-admission on the morning of the following day. Babu Surendra Nath Banerjea came out to this country as a Member of the Bengal Civil Service in Septem- ber 1871. SURENDRA NATH AS A CIVIL SERVANT AND HIS DIFFICULTIES. He came back to his mother country and was posted as an Assistant Magistrate at Sylhet, one of the dis- tricts now under the jurisdiction of the Chief Commis- sioner of Assam, but then under the Lieutenant-Go- vernor of Bengal. Sir George Campbell was then on the Bengal Musnad, and Lord Northbrook was then the Viceroy and Governor-General of India. Scarcely two years elapsed since he had joined when unfortun- ately for the Government, and fortunately for the coun- try, certain charges were brought against him. The sum and substance of these charges was that in a particular case he had directed the transfer of a case to the Ferari Register and had improperly (the official word was "dishonestly," though we fail to see where- in the dishonesty lies at least as far as this aspect of the case was concerned) issued a warrant, and when called upon to explain it made false statement with re- gard to it. This was the sum and substance of the allegations made against Babu Surendra Nath Baner- jea, but it was spun out into fourteen charges, and the matter assumed the proportions of a state trial. Mr. O'Kehealy who had prosecuted the Wahabi Amirudin was Surendra Nath's prosecutor, and Mr. Prinsep (then Judge of Hugli) who was the judge in that case was also Surendra Nath's Judge. *'Is Surendra Nath a Wahabi" exclaimed Kristo Dass Pal in the columns of