That the new administrator, warned by the severe example made of his predecessor, is represented by the said Warren Hastings as having made it his “avowed principle” (as it might be expected it should be) “that the sum fixed for the revenue must be collected.”  And he did, upon the principle aforesaid, and by the means suggested by a principle of that sort, accordingly levy from the country, and did regularly discharge to the British Resident at Benares, by monthly payments, the sums imposed by the said Warren Hastings, as it is asserted by the Resident, Fowke; but the said Warren Hastings did assert that his annual collections did not amount to more than Lac 37,37,600, or thereabouts, which he says is much short of the revenues of the province, and is by about twenty-four thousand pounds short of his agreement.

That it further appears, that, notwithstanding the new administrator aforesaid was appointed two months, or thereabouts, after the beginning of the Fusseli year, that is to say, about the middle of November, 1782, and the former administrator had collected a certain portion of the revenues of that year, amounting to 17,000_l._ and upwards, yet he, the said new administrator, upon the unjust and destructive principle aforesaid, suggested by the cruel and violent proceedings of the said Warren Hastings towards his predecessor, did levy on the province, within the said year, the whole amount of the revenues to be collected, in addition to the sum collected by his predecessor aforesaid.

That, on account of a great drought which prevailed in the province aforesaid, a remission of certain duties in grain was proposed by the chief criminal judge at Benares; but the administrator aforesaid, being fearful that the revenue should fall short in his hands, did strenuously oppose himself to the necessary relief to the inhabitants of the said city.

That, notwithstanding the cantonment of several bodies of the Company’s troops within the province, since the abolition of the native government, it became subject in a particular manner to the depredations of the Rajahs upon the borders; insomuch that in one quarter no fewer than thirty villages had been sacked and burned, and the inhabitants reduced to the most extreme distress.

That the Resident, in his letter to the board at Calcutta, did represent that the collection of the revenue was become very difficult, and, besides the extreme drought, did assign for a cause of that difficulty the following.  “That there is also one fund which in former years was often applied in this country to remedy temporary inconveniences in the revenue, and which in the present year does not exist.  This was the private fortunes of merchants and shroffs [bankers] resident in Benares, from whom aumils [collectors] of credit could obtain temporary loans to satisfy the immediate calls of the Rajah.  These sums, which used to circulate between the aumil and the merchant, have been turned into a different channel, by bills of exchange to defray the expenses of government, both on the west coast of India, and also at Madras.”  To which representation it does not appear that any answer was given, or that any mode of redress was adopted in consequence thereof.