ABSTRACT
A declaration of a non-expansionist policy was made in 1784, and in 1786 Cornwallis was sent out to India as Governor-General with express instructions to avoid war. These instructions had little relation to reality in the circumstances of the fight for power which was then taking place throughout India. By the beginning of the nineteenth century British forces were maintained in Mysore, Hyderabad and Oudh, and either in this way or by direct rule Britain controlled large areas of India. Once again the authorities in London misconceived the Indian situation, and once again the liberal and high-minded Cornwallis was sent as Governor-General to implement an unworkable policy. The English had advanced so far along the road to Empire in India as to make it impossible for any Indian ruler to become the focal point of an Indian political system. Bands of robbers were, indeed, one of the gravest scourges of central India at that time.
