When he signed the paper he remarked the omission of all mention of Eesa Meean’s associates in that document, but did not consider it to be his duty to point out the oversight, lest it might increase the excitement, and prolong the angry discussions. In his report of the circumstances to the Resident, however, he mentioned it to him, and told him that the omission clearly arose from an oversight, and unless his associates received the same indulgence as the principal, Eesa Meean himself, their exclusion from the benefits of the engagement might be attributed to decoit or artifice on his part. The Resident concurred in this opinion, and in his report of the following day to Government, he recommended that they should all be considered as included in the engagement.
Government, in its reply of the 25th of June 1824, consents to this construction of the written engagement, but notices a no less important oversight on the part of the Resident and his Assistant, in the free pardon given to Eesa Meean, for the share he had taken in the Bareilly insurrection, which had caused the loss of so many lives in April 1816. Government infers, that they could, neither of them have been aware, that this ruffian was the original instigator and most active leader in that formidable insurrection; that it was chiefly, if not entirely, owing to his endeavours to inflame the popular phrenzy, and to collect partizans from the neighbouring towns, that the efforts of the local authorities, to quell or avert the rising storm, failed wholly of success; that he stood charged as a principal in the murder of Mr. Leycester’s son, and that, on these grounds, he was expressly excluded from the general amnesty, declared after the successful suppression of the rebellion, and a reward of two thousand rupees offered for his arrest; that this written pledge had involved Government in the dilemma of either cancelling a public act of the British Resident, or pardoning and setting at large, within its territory, a proclaimed outlaw, and notorious rebel and most dangerous incendiary; and that it felt bound in duty to guard the public peace from the hazard of further interruption, through the violence or intrigue of so desperate and atrocious an offender; and to annul that part of the engagement which absolves Eesa Meean from his guilt in the Bareilly insurrection, since the Resident and his Assistant went beyond their powers in pledging their Government to such a condition. Government directed, that he and his associates should be safely escorted over the border into the British territory, and that he should not be brought to trial before a Judicial Court, with a view to his being capitally punished for his crimes at Bareilly, but be confined, as a state prisoner, in the fortress of Allahabad. The Government, in strong but dignified terms, expresses its surprise and displeasure at his having been placed in so confidential a position, and permitted to bask in the sunshine of ministerial favour, when active search was being made for him all over India; for the King and his minister must have been both aware of the part he had taken in the Bareilly insurrection, since the King himself alludes to it in a letter submitted by the Resident to Government on the 8th of June 1824.