Hastings, Warren, 1732–1818, first governor-general of British India. Employed (1750) as a clerk by the East India Company, he soon became manager of a trading post in Bengal. When Calcutta (now Kolkata) was captured (1756) by Siraj-ud-Daula, Hastings was taken prisoner but soon released. After the British recapture (1757) of the city, he was made British resident at Murshidabad. Good service there brought appointment to the Calcutta council (1761), but he returned to England (1764) disgusted with administrative corruption in Bengal.

Hastings went back (1769) to India as a member of the Madras council and became (1772) governor of Bengal, immediately embarking on a course of judicial and financial reform, law codification, and the suppression of banditry, measures that laid the foundation of direct British rule in India. In 1774, he was appointed governor-general of India. This position was created by Lord North's Regulating Act (1773), which also set up a four-member governing council. In the succeeding years Hastings was greatly hampered by opposition in the council, especially from Sir Philip Francis Francis, Sir Philip, 1740–1818, British statesman and pamphleteer. He may have been the author known as Junius . He held several minor posts in government offices before being appointed to the council of Bengal in 1773.
..... Click the link for more information. . Another problem he encountered in his new position was the ill-defined relationship with and resulting lack of control over the subordinate provincial governors. The interference of the Bombay government in Maratha affairs led to a war with the Marathas, while the blunders of the Madras government provoked conflict with Haidar Ali Haidar Ali or Hyder Ali (both: hī`dər älē`), 1722–82, Indian ruler.
..... Click the link for more information. of Mysore. In both cases Hastings, conscious of the danger of French intervention, dispatched armies from Bengal that saved the British position. Nonetheless he was criticized for interference with the provincial governments.

Hastings resigned (1784) and returned to England, where he was charged with high crimes and misdemeanors by Edmund Burke Burke, Edmund, 1729–97, British political writer and statesman, b. Dublin, Ireland.

Early Writings

After graduating (1748) from Trinity College, Dublin, he began the study of law in London but abandoned it to devote himself to writing.
..... Click the link for more information. and Sir Philip Francis, whom he had wounded in a duel in India. The chief charges against him concerned his extortion of money from the rajah of Benares and the begum of Oudh, his hiring out of British troops to the nawab of Oudh to subdue the Rohillas (a warlike Afghan tribe), and his alleged responsibility for the judicial murder of an Indian merchant, Nandkumar. He was impeached in 1787; but the trial, begun in 1788, ended with acquittal in 1795, despite the bitter prosecution of Burke, Francis, Richard B. Sheridan, and Charles James Fox. Hastings's fortune was spent in the defense, but the East India Company contributed to his later support. He became popular and was made a privy councilor (1814).

Bibliography

See biographies by A. M. Davies (1935), K. G. Feiling (1955, repr. 1967), and J. Bernstein (2000); studies by P. Moon (1947, repr. 1962) and P. J. Marshall (1965).

Hastings, Warren

Warren Hastings, oil painting by Tilly Kettle; in the National Portrait Gallery, London.

(credit: Courtesy of The National Portrait Gallery, London)

(born Dec. 6, 1732, Churchill, near Daylesford, Oxfordshire, Eng.—died Aug. 22, 1818, Daylesford) British colonial administrator in India. He worked for the English East India Company from 1750, rising to membership in its council in Bengal (1761–64) and Madras (now Chennai; 1769). As governor of Bengal (1772–74), he moved the central government to Calcutta (now Kolkata) under direct British control and remodeled the justice system. In 1774 he acquired the new title of governor-general, with responsibilities for supervising other British settlements in India. His powers were shared with a council of four, several of whom tried to blame Hastings for the continuing abuses of power by Englishmen. From 1777 to 1783 he sought to counter the instability created by the fall of the Mughal Empire and tried to maintain peaceful relations with neighbouring states but was drawn into the Maratha Wars. This disrupted the company's trade and antagonized opinion in England, as did several dubious ventures Hastings entered into to raise extra funds. In 1785 he left India at peace and retired to England. In 1786 Edmund Burke introduced an impeachment process against him on charges of corruption; after a trial that lasted from 1788 to 1795, Hastings was acquitted.