Reforms 

 necessary. 



412 MANUAL OF THE NTLAGIRI DISTRICT. 



CH. XXII. To the absence of auytliing approacliing a village police, 

 P(^LicE. maintained by land endowments or the fees of the village, may 

 also be attributed the fact that there are no hereditary thieves in 

 the district, like the Dundassies in Ganjam, the Kavilgar of 

 Trichinopoly, and the Talliaries of Cuddapah. There can however 

 be no question that an effective police administration of the hills 

 must have as an antecedent condition the organization of a 

 domestic police, or at all events the education of the heads of 

 villages to a due knowledge and appreciation of their responsi- 

 bilities and duties as the dispensers of justice in petty cases and 

 as the protectors of the lives and properties, not only of their fellow 

 villagers, but also as guardians of the public peace generally. 



New constab- In establishing, therefore, a constabulary on the Nilagiris 



" ^^^' constituted on the European model, the Government met with 



no obstacles among the people arising out of the vested interests 

 of the old watchmen, or the prejudice, conservatism, or fears 

 of the people ; but at the same time this new constabulary was 

 deprived of the aid which it obtained elsewhere from the experi- 

 ence and knowledge of the ancient hereditary police, whether 

 honest or dishonest. Prior to the introduction of the regular 

 police system elaborated by Sir William (then Mr.) Eobinson, it 

 may be said that outside the limits of Ootacamand no police 

 existed on the Hills. The peons of the Revenue oflficers — chiefly 

 those of the Tahsildar — appear, under the system that prevailed 

 from 1816 to 1859, to have done the little police work that was 

 done, but how imperfectly this was performed has already been 

 the subject of remark in Chapter XII. The failure of the police 

 administration was one of the principal causes which produced 

 changes in the higher executive agency of the district. Ootaca- 

 mand possessed, from the year 1820 to 1855, a military police, 

 and until the military control was finally and radically abolished 

 in the civil stations this police remained under the orders of the 

 mihtaiy magistrate, under the style, at one time, of Officer 

 Commanding, at another, of Commandant of the Nilagiris. The 

 establishment of the military depot at Wellington was the imme- 

 diate cause of the abolition of this police. 



Present The present police organization of the district is as follows. 



orjianization. -pj^^ Superintendent of Police, Coimbatore, exercises a general 

 control over the Nilagiri district — an arrangement which has 

 continued from the time when the Hills proper formed a taluk 

 of that district. The officer immediately in charge is the Cliief 

 Inspector, on a salary of Rupees 350, who has under him 1 

 Inspector and 2 Sub-Inspectors. The Chief Inspector has taken the 

 place of an Assistant Superintendent, an office which was abolished 

 in 1875. The duties and responsibilities of the Chief Inspector 

 have considerably increased by the annexation to the district of 



