polymetrical tables, which fixed the charges to be levied on the principal routes. The Act of 1837 caused a great deal of dissatisfaction owing to the abolition of many private and well-organized services which were not at once replaced, or else replaced very inefficiently, by Government services. The landholders had to pay a local cess to maintain the District Posts, and they felt it a distinct grievance that they should have to pay for the upkeep of these, as well as fees for their correspondence, while all official letters were carried free of charge. An inquiry made by Captain Taylor of the Bengal Establishment into the working of the 1837 Act brought many of these grievances to light, and on his recommendation certain improvements were made in the interests of the landholders. Thus there grew up in India a dual system of posts—on the one hand, the Imperial Post, which controlled all main routes and large offices; on the other, the District Post, which was entirely local and controlled the rural services in each district. The establishments were quite separate, and where the two systems came in contact there was often a great deal of friction.

The principle on which the District Post was based was the liability of landholders to maintain communications for Government purposes between the executive head of a district and his subordinates in outlying places—a responsibility which in many instances they were glad to discharge by a money payment to the magistrate who undertook the organization of the requisite agency. The laws under which it was administered were framed with the object of levying a small cess in each district. This was used, at the discretion of the magistrate, for the payment of dak-runners and other persons who conveyed correspondence between police stations and district officials. This local post undoubtedly existed from ancient times, and its maintenance was a liability to which the landholders had been subject from a period long before the advent of British rule.

The District Post in India, which was an important, though not very efficient, auxiliary to the Imperial Post, thus owed its origin to the need for maintaining the means of official communication between the head-quarters of each district and the revenue and police stations in the interior, where the general wants of the locality were not such as to call for the provision of Imperial post offices. It consisted of lines of communication connecting such stations, and was maintained primarily for the conveyance of official correspondence in accordance with the requirements of each district, but subsequently it was also made available for private correspondence.

In some parts of the country the cost of the District Post lines was met by local cesses specially levied for the purpose, and in other places it was met from Imperial or provincial grants as a charge on the general revenues of the country.

Originally the District Post in India was managed by district officers or other local officials quite independently of the Imperial Post, but, in order to increase the efficiency of the service, Local Governments and Administrations were asked to transfer the management to the officers of the Imperial Post Office. The North-Western Provinces (now United Provinces) Government was the first to accept the proposal, and the management of the District Post there was taken over by the Postmaster-General of the circle in the year 1864. This arrangement did not constitute an incorporation of the District Post with the Imperial Post, but merely a transfer of the management of the former to the officers of the latter, the financial control of the District Post remaining as before with the Local Government. As was anticipated, this measure led to rapid development of private correspondence, an acceleration of the speed at which the mails were carried and a marked improvement in the postal arrangements in the interior of districts. Consequently the objections which were at first raised in many quarters were silenced, and the other Local Governments and Administrations soon fell into line, so that in the course of the next fourteen years the management of the whole of the District Post throughout India was gradually transferred to the Imperial Post Office.

As the number of Imperial post offices increased the primary object of the District Post became less important and its funds were devoted more and more to the extension of rural delivery and postal facilities in backward rural tracts. As these tracts developed and the postal traffic produced sufficient revenue to cover the expenditure the Imperial Post took them over, and the money thus set free was used to start offices, lines and rural messengers in country not yet opened. In this way the District Post acted the part of pioneer to the Imperial Post and greatly assisted its progress.

In 1903, in connection with the revision of the Provincial Settlements, the Government of India decided to abolish the exceptional arrangement under which, in some provinces, a portion of the revenue and expenditure in connection with the District Post was included in the Provincial accounts. It was ordered that from the commencement of the new settlements all such receipts and charges which were then Provincial would be made Imperial. In accordance with this decision all the District Post establishments in the Presidencies of Bengal and Madras and the Province of Assam, which were formerly paid from Provincial funds, were brought directly on the general establishment of the Imperial Post Office with effect from the 1st April, 1904. Two years later the Government of India decided to take over the remaining District Post charges in India, and the District Post was abolished entirely with effect from the 1st April, 1906. It was at the same time ordered that from that date every postal charge would be an Imperial one and that no postal charges of any description whatsoever might be incurred from Provincial or Local funds.

In 1850 three Commissioners, Messrs. Courtney, Forbes and Beadon, were appointed by the Government of India to inquire into the methods for making the Post Office more efficient and more conducive to the convenience of the public than it had been hitherto.

In 1851 the Commissioners, after making exhaustive inquiries, presented a report which dealt with every phase of Post Office work, and on this report has been based the whole fabric of the present administration. The most important questions discussed were:

(1) The necessity for a uniform rate of postage irrespective of distance.

(2) The need for prepayment of postage by means of adhesive postage stamps.

(3) The fixing of a low initial rate of postage.

(4) The abolition of franking.

(5) The formation of the Post Office as an Imperial Department under a Director-General, with Postmasters-General in each province who would not be subject to the authority of the Local Government.

(6) The publication of Manual Rules for the use of postal officials.

(7) The establishment of sorting offices at suitable places.

(8) The introduction of money orders.

(9) The regulation of the Bhangy or Parcel Post.

(10) The introduction of cheap and uniform postage for newspapers, books, pamphlets, etc.

(11) The transfer of District Posts to the Imperial Post Office.

The report of the Commissioners is contained in a bulky volume of some six hundred pages, of which the preamble is most interesting and throws a great deal of light on the domestic history of India in the first half of the nineteenth century. The reforms are based throughout on the principle that the Post Office is to be maintained for the benefit of the people of India