The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke

injustice and oppression.

XIV. That, in consequence of the aforesaid motives, and others pretended, which were by
no means a sufficient justification to the said Warren Hastings, he did appoint the woman
aforesaid, called Munny Begum, who had been of the lowest and most discreditable order
in society, according to the ideas prevalent in India, but from whom he received several
sums of money, to be guardian to the Nabob in preference to his own mother, and to
administer the affairs of the government in the place of the said Mahomed Reza Khân, the
second Mussulman in rank after the Nabob, and the first in knowledge, gravity, weight, and
character among the Mussulmen of that province. And in order to try every method and to
take every chance for his destruction, the said Warren Hastings did maliciously and
oppressively keep him under confinement, for a part of the time without any inquiry, and
afterwards with a slow and dilatory trial, for two years together.

XV. That, notwithstanding a total revolution in the power, in part avowedly made for his
destruction, the persons appointed for his trial did, on full inquiry, completely acquit the
said Mahomed Reza Khân of the criminal charges against him, on account of which he had
been so long persecuted and confined, and suffered much in mind, body, and fortune: and
the Court of Directors, in their letter of the 3d of March, 1775, testify their satisfaction in
the conduct and result of the said inquiry, and did direct the restoration of the said
Mahomed Reza Khân to liberty, and to the offices which he had lately held, which
comprehended the management of the Nabob's household, and the general superintendency
of the justice of Bengal; but, according to the orders of the Court of Directors, his
appointments were reduced to thirty thousand pounds a year, or thereabouts, of which he
did make grievous complaint, on account of the expenses attendant on his station, and the

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