IOR/L/PS/20/CA10

Confidential printed abstracts of letters received by the India Office from the Government of India, and from senior officials in certain areas outside India, during the year 1870. The letters are dated December 1869-December 1870. The abstracts each have one of the following titles:

• Abstracts of Secret Letters received from India
• Abstracts of Letters received from India
• Abstracts of Military Letters received from India
• Abstracts of Letters received from Zanzibar and Muscat
• Abstracts of Letters received from Aden
• Abstracts of Letters received from Muscat
• Abstracts of Letters received from Bushire [Bushehr]
• Abstracts of Letters received from Aden and Zanzibar
• Abstracts of Letters received from Bushire and Aden
• Abstracts of Letters received from Zanzibar and Aden.

Each abstract contains summaries of one or more letters from the specified source, each with a title giving the subject of the letter. Letters from India are divided within each abstract by the branch or department of the Government of India they originated from. The correspondence covers issues including:

• Pay, pensions, recruitment, and other personnel issues in the Indian Civil and Military establishments
• Public works, including: railways, including a proposed railway from the Mediterranean to the Persian Gulf; roads; canals; irrigation; docks; and river embankments
• Revenue, expenditure, and taxation
• Land issues, including: the cultivation of cotton, cinchona, and silk; forestry; and coal mining
• Education
• Banking
• Telegraphy, including international telegraphic links to India
• Affairs concerning Princely States, including internal administration, debts, allowances, issues of succession, investment in railways, and territorial claims
• Issues around emigration from India to British and French colonies
• Legislative and judicial affairs, including the question of jurisdiction over British subjects in the Persian Gulf
• Military affairs, including the organisation and supply of military units and a proposed naval force for the Indian seas and the Persian Gulf
• Frontier affairs: relations with tribes on the Northwest and Northeast Frontiers and frontier raids
• Affairs in Persia [Iran], including: Persian claims to sovereignty over Bahrein [Bahrain] and objection to British actions in Bahrein; frontier disputes around Khelat [Kalat], Mekran [Makran], and Seistan [Sistan] and proposed arbitration of the Persian-Afghan border; anticipated food shortages and subsequent disturbances involving British subjects exporting grain from Bushire
• Affairs in the Sultanate of Muscat and Oman, including: the consolidation of and challenges to the rule of Syud Azan [Azzān bin Qays Āl Bū Sa‘īd]; debates around British policy towards Syud Azan; confrontation between Muscat and the Wahabees [Waḥabī movement]; the issue of the Zanzibar subsidy; and Syud Azan’s claims to Bunder Abbas [Bandar-e ‘Abbas], Gwadur [Gwadar], Charbar [Chabahar] and other territories on the Mekran Coast
• Affairs in the Persian Gulf, including: the campaign of Colonel Lewis Pelly in Bahrein and the installation of Esau bin Ali [‘Īsá bin ‘Alī Āl Khalīfah] as Ruler; trade and shipping in the Gulf; the desire of the Shah of Persia for a naval presence in the Gulf; Dutch and Turkish [Ottoman] activity in the region; and tensions between Bahrein and the Wahabees, including Wahabee inroads in the Guttur peninsula [Qatar]
• Affairs in Affghanistan [Afghanistan], including relations with Bokhara [Emirate of Bukhara] and Russia
• Central Asian affairs, including the Russian advance in the region, trade and communication from India to Central Asia via Cashmere [Kashmir] and Ladak [Ladakh], and affairs in Eastern Turkestan [Xinjiang]
• Affairs in Zanzibar, including the slave trade, relations with Muscat, the death of Syud Majid [Mājid bin Sa‘īd Āl Bū Sa‘īd], and the accession to the throne of Syud Burgash [Barghash bin Sa‘īd Āl Bū Sa‘īd]
• Affairs in and around Aden Settlement, including: relations with neighbouring polities, including Lahej [Laḥij Sultanate], Houshebi [Ḥawshabī Sultanate], Fodtheli [Faḍlī Sultanate], and Kathiree [Kathīrī Sultanate]; the purchase of Little Aden; the defences of Aden; an attack on Hodeida [Al Hudaydah] from Aseer [‘Asir] and the threat to Lahej from the Zaidees [Zaidīs]
• Affairs in the Red Sea, including attempted French, Austrian, Turkish, and Egyptian inroads in the region
• Affairs in Burmah [Burma/Myanmar], Bhootan [Bhutan], and Nipal [Nepal].

The primary correspondents are:

• The Government of India
• The Viceroy and Governor-General of India
• The Resident at Aden
• The Political Resident in the Persian Gulf
• The Political Agent in Muscat
• The Political Agent in Zanzibar.