Page:The Marquess Cornwallis and the Consolidation of British Rule.djvu/141

Rh abused their powers and had been guilty of acts of oppression in connection with the distraint and sale of the property of their tenants. It was advisable to amend the law of distraint and to revise the rules for granting pattás, as well as those under which auction purchasers might collect their rents; and also to relieve defaulting Zamíndárs and farmers from a heavy penalty of twelve per cent, interest. It was therefore enacted that Zamíndárs were bound to serve their tenants with a written demand specifying the precise amount of their arrears. The notice was to be served personally on the tenant or affixed at his usual place of residence; and by way of relief or compensation the tenant, if he disputed the justice of the demand, was enabled to get the attachment taken off by making a certain application within five days and binding himself to institute a civil suit to contest the distraint and attachment within other fifteen days. But this provision was somewhat clogged with formalities, and in practice it was inoperative. The defaulting tenant had to execute a bond with a surety before either a Commissioner, a Judge, a Collector, or the Kázi of the Parganá — a nondescript kind of functionary — that he would speedily institute his suit; and a civil suit in those days involved much trouble, a good deal of time, and no inconsiderable outlay.

If the suit was not instituted within the prescribed time, the attachment revived against the person and the property of the defaulter who had