A JUDGE IN MADRAS CAROLINE KEEN A Judge in Madras Sir Sidney Wadsworth and the Indian Civil Service, 1913–1947 HURST & COMPANY, LONDON First published in the United Kingdom in 2020 by C. Hurst & Co. (Publishers) Ltd., 41 Great Russell Street, London, WC1B 3PL © Caroline Keen, 2020 All rights reserved. Printed in the United Kingdom Distributed in the United States, Canada and Latin America by Oxford University Press, 198 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016, United States of America. The right of Caroline Keen to be identified as the author of this publication is asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988. A Cataloguing-in-Publication data record for this book is available from the British Library. ISBN: 9781787383241 This book is printed using paper from registered sustainable and managed sources. www.hurstpublishers.com CONTENTS Author’s Preface vii Map viii Introduction ix Sir Sidney Wadsworth Timeline xv List of Illustrations xvii 1. The History of Madras 1 2. Madras 1913 11 3. Vellore 1913–14 25 4. Gudur 1916–17 35 5. The Secretariat 1918–19 53 6. Two Interludes 1920–21 61 7. Madanapalle 1921–24 69 8. Political Warfare: Godaveri 1921 87 9. The Board 1924 97 10. Below the Lighthouse 1925 107 11. Chingleput 1926–28 121 12. Scouting 135 13. Madura 1929–33 143 14. Some Criminals 155 15. Thieves, Usurers and Snake-Catchers 163 16. Kodaikanal 175 17. Chittoor and Bangalore 1934–35 187 18. The Honourable Mr Justice 1935–47 195 v CONTENTS 19. Gardening in South India 211 20. Madras at War 221 21. Envoi 235 Notes 245 Bibliography 271 Index 277 vi AUTHOR’S PREFACE The core of the book is obviously the Wadsworth memoirs which, due to Sidney’s ability to bring people and places to life, provided a fine base. I have added biographical details of some of the people with whom he worked in Madras and, as a backdrop to his career, included a broad sweep of the highly significant events which were occurring across India as a prologue to independence. I have also added excerpts from the private papers of other members of the Indian Civil Service based in Madras during the first half of the twentieth century to give some different perspectives on life in the province. All otherwise unat- tributed quotations are drawn from Sidney’s memoirs. It has been a great pleasure to follow Sidney’s Indian progression. I was blessed with the most interesting and entertaining subject, and I am very grateful to Simon and Tim for giving me the opportunity to explore a major part of their grandfather’s life. Caroline Keen, August 2019 vii INTRODUCTION In 1947, my grandfather Sir Sidney Wadsworth retired from his posi- tion as a High Court Judge in Madras, India. Along with many mem- bers of the former Indian Civil Service (ICS) who retired at or around Indian independence, he retired to the UK, and in his particular case, to the Isle of Man, where the parents of his wife Lady (Olive) Wadsworth had lived. During the first long winter he spent in retire- ment he hand-wrote his lengthy (375-page) memoirs of his time in India, and had them typed and annotated. He evidently decided that there was limited demand at that time for his memoirs in book form (there were obviously many retirees from the ICS who had similar ideas!). So at some point he consigned the manuscript to the bottom of the Library of the Centre of South Asian Studies at Cambridge University, his alma mater. Fast-forward sixty-three years to 2009, and I was in the process of retiring from full-time employment. One day I idly Googled the name ‘Sir Sidney Wadsworth’, and much to my surprise up pops a record of the manuscript; I was able to obtain copies, and promptly sent them to his two daughters, to my mother (my father, Robert, was Sidney and Olive’s only son and died in 1998), and to my brother Tim. Much to my surprise, none had any idea that my grandfather had written the manuscript. Several years passed during which I showed the manuscript to acquaintances with academic backgrounds and with an interest in Indian history, and most found the manuscript to be fascinating. I also read it, ix