Page:The Marquess Cornwallis and the Consolidation of British Rule.djvu/93

Rh other zillahs were curtailed by the formation of smaller independent districts, such as Bárásat, Bográ, Pabná, and others.

The Collector, to sum up, was placed by Cornwallis in a definite, important, well-salaried post. He was responsible for the land revenue of a vast tract, which in amount varied from ten to twenty lacks of rupees. He looked after the estates of minors, and of landowners incapacitated by lunacy or other causes. He was the Superintendent of all estates held khás, as it is termed, on those in which the Government had acquired the Zamíndárí or landholder's, as well as the sovereign right. He was paymaster of pensioners and allowances for compensation. He was the recognised authority for the division of estates between irreconcilable shareholders. He alone could apportion the liability for revenue of each share. He collected the tax on spirituous liquors. He was to put up the estates of defaulting proprietors to public sale. He was formally placed under the Board of Revenue, with which he was regularly to correspond.

The popular idea of a Collector in England is or was an individual with a note-book and certain forms and schedules and demands, calling at inconvenient times for the Queen's taxes or the parish rates, and viewed with aversion and dislike by householders. From the time of Cornwallis the Anglo-Indian collector became a Court of Wards, as well as a Court of Exchequer, and on his moderation, good faith, skill,