CHARTERS BROUGHT BY EAST INDIA

COMMANY
CHARTER OF 1677, 1683,
1687
 The Charter of 1677 empowered the Company to establish a mint at
Bombay for coining money, Indian rupees.

 The Charter 1683 gave the company full powers with respect to
declaring wars and making peace with heathen nation (the nation
where people do not follow Christianity) and the king established a
Court of Justice with maritime jurisdiction.

 The Courts were empowered to “adjudge and determine cases

according to the rules of equity and good conscience and the laws and
customs of Merchants.”
CHARTER OF 1669
 It also enlarged its administrative, judicial and other governmental
powers.

 The East India Company was also invested with Civil and
Military Government.
 For the first time the Charter of 1669 gave territorial sovereignty
to the East India Company by granting to it the port of Bombay.
It also enlarged its administrative, judicial and
other governmental powers.

The East India Company was also invested

with Civil and Military Government.
For the first time the Charter of 1669 gave
territorial sovereignty to the East India
Company by granting to it the port of Bombay.
After 1683 the authority of the Crown to give charters and
create monopoly was challenged in England by the People
and the Parliament and on January, 1964, the Parliament
had resolved that all subjects of England have equal rights
to trade with the East Indies unless prohibited by the Act
of Parliament.

With the emergence of the supremacy of the Parliament

after the Glorious Revolution of 1668 in England, the
system of granting Royal Charter by the Crown ceased,
and henceforth, the Parliament itself assumed that power.
CEASE OF ROYAL CHARTER
 The affairs of the company in England as well as in India were
governed by the Charters up to 1773. The Company’s Governors
and Agents in India administered the Company’s affairs as well as
the territorial Governments of India according to rules of law and
constitution as provided in these charters.
 It was the step on the Indian soil for the creation of a constitutional
Government although in a very small strip of the territoRY