IOR/L/PS/7/35, ff 396-428

This item consists of a General Despatch with enclosures from the Government of India’s Foreign Department to the Secretary of State for India, Number 21 of 1883, dated 6 February 1883, and received by the India Office’s Political Department on 28 February 1883. The enclosures date from 15 December 1881 to 23 January 1883. An abstract of contents is present at folios 398-399.

The Despatch includes enclosures consisting of:

• Letters between the following: the Political Resident in the Persian Gulf; Mirza Abdul Kassim [Mīrzā ‘Abd al-Qāsim], Native Agent at El-Bidaa [Al Bidda, now a neighbourhood of Doha]; Jasim bin Mohammed bin Tahani [Jāsim bin Muḥammad Āl Thānī], Shaikh and Governor of El-Bidaa; and British Indian traders [South Asian merchants, also described as ‘banians’ Hindoos, and Indians] residing at El-Bidaa. The correspondence concerns the unpleasant treatment allegedly given by Jassim bin Tahani to the traders
• A report by Captain Thomas Peere Williams Nesham, Commander of HMS Woodlark, on the view of the situation at El-Bidaa among the inhabitants of the Batinah [Al Batinah] and ‘Pirate’ [Arab] coasts of the Persian Gulf
• The view of other South Asian merchants in Katr [Qatar] and Bahrain on the ill-treatment.

The principal correspondents are: the Political Resident in the Persian Gulf; the Resident Agent, Bahrain; the Foreign Department, Government of India; Jassim bin Mohammed bin Tahani; and Mirza Abdul Kassim.