After the Battle of Plassey in 1757, the East India Company held the administrative and judicial powers under itself of Bengal, Bihar and Orissa. The jurisdiction of mofussil (i.e. larger areas beyond the limits of preicidency towns) was completely under the Company. The judicial organization provided by the Company in moffusil was called the Adalat System whose initial milestone was laid down in Bengal with Warren Hastings as the Governor of Bengal. With the Regulating Act passed in 1773, Warren Hastings was made the Governor General of all the British territories in India and the reforms of 1774 and 1780 were passed. The Company was dissatisfied with the plan of 1780 because it had separated the revenue and judicial functions, thus proving to be costly. Accordingly, the Directors advocated a merger of the two functions on the grounds of simplicity, efficiency and economy. Lord Cornwallis assumed the role of Governor-General of the Company in 1786 and continued till 1793. He was directed to take up three specific matters, one of them being reforms of the judicial system. The other tasks were resolving the problem of land revenue and improvement in the administrative machinery. During his tenure, he made significant and far-reaching reforms in the judicial administration, some of which constitute the foundation of the present legal system. The reforms were primarily made in three stages: first in 1787, then in 1790 and, finally in 1793.
Judicial Plan of 1787
The main feature of this plan, as previously stated, was that the revenue, judicial and magisterial functions would vest in one person, the Collector who was incharge of each district. Firstly, Lord Cornwallis reduced the number of districts from 36 to 23. Only the East India Company’s English servant could be appointed to the said post. The Collector was responsible for the collection of land revenue and to