26 SOCIAL SCIENTIST Macaulay, the Law Member of the Governor-General's Legislative Council, of the attempts of the Europeans to form a racial oligarchy8 and his intentions to remove the judicial inequality through Act XI of 1836, the situation not only defied improvement but rather became worse. The unhindered flow of Europeans opened the country for colonial exploitation from end to end. In 1837, the Government enacted* that any subject of the Grown could acquire and hold in perpetuity land in any part of the territories of the Company. This provision was fully utilized by the European settlers in India to increase their ilaka cultivation. The settlers (in north Bihar mainly indigo planters) acted as the agents of imperialist exploitation wield ing considerable influence on the local administration. Bloodstains in Indigo Blue Indigo cultivation in Bengal, of which Bihar was a part till its separation in 1912, entailed an unimaginable amount of human suffering. Lord Macaulay was aware of the fact as is apparent from one of his minutes which read: "That great evils exist, tnat great injustice is frequently committed, that many ryots have been brought—partly by the operation of the law and partly by the acts committed in defiance of the law, into a state not very far removed from that of predial slavery is, I fear, too certain.995 "Not a chest of indigo,'9 later on reported a British official to the Indigo Commission, "reached England without being stained with human blood99.6 The manner of carryirg indigo cultivation was nothing short of a "system of bloodshed9'7 consciously done to further colonial and imperialistic ends. The experiences of the Indian Mutiny suggested to the British government the expediency of an alliance between the Indian zamindars and the foreign agents of imperialism, the planters. This alliance, it was hoped, would form a strong bulwark to buttress British rule. Sir Charles Wood, Secretary of State for India, even proposed in 1862 a gradual extension of the "Permanent Settlement9'' to other pans of India. In pursuance of his idea to create throughout the country pockets of local influence to counteract popular movements, he advised the distribution of waste land to planters at nominal rates8. It would thus be seen that the administration was hand in glove with the planters to safeguard imperial interests. The planters enjoyed enormous powers, and as members of the ruling race, were free to misuse them. They often settled their scores with the help of Lathiyals and their regiment of Dhangers. The ryots were the chief victims of these violent affrays for their crops were destroyed, villages ransacked and cattle driven off. On the blood and tears of the ryots the planters led a princely life in their secluded clubs, polo-grounds and palaces9. They exercised "semifeudal powers9910 over their ryots and even the best of the officers could not check their "despotic control99 which often "degenerated into cruel oppression99.11 They were tyrants in "filling