Charles Tegart

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Sir Charles Augustus Tegart (1881 - April 6, 1946) was the second son of Reverend Joseph Poulter Tegart. He joined as the head of the Detective Department of Calcutta Police and virtually controlled the Special Branch since his joining Calcutta Police in 1901. He served almost continuously in Bengal for a period of thirty years until he was appointed a member of the Secretary of State's Indian Council in December, 1931. He was the first officer of the Indian Police (IP) in the organization and on his report the Special Branch was created. He reorganized the city police force and made it efficient. He was a highly decorated officer, awarded the King's Police Medal in 1911. He became the Superintendent of Police in 1908, Deputy Commissioner in 1913, Deputy-Inspector General (Intelligence) in 1918 and the Commissioner of Calcutta Police in the years 1923 - 1931. He was admired for keeping the city free from crime. However, he earned tremendous notoriety amongst the freedom fighters of Bengal for being an obdurate opponent of Indian nationalism to the point of illegality and, for the ruthless torture of prisoners. Sir Charles Tegart was involved in a skirmish with Indian revolutionaries led by Jatindranath Mukherjee at Balasore in Orissa on September 9, 1915. An attempt to murder Sir Charles Tegart was made on January 12, 1924 at Chowringhee street in Calcutta by Gopinath Saha, an Indian revolutionary, but he erroneously shot down a resident of Calcutta, Ernest Day, whom he mistook for Tegart. Another attempt to murder Tegart was made on August 25, 1930 at Dalhousie Square in Calcutta by throwing a bomb into the car in which Tegart was travelling, but Tegart shot down the revolutionary and escaped unhurt.

Tegart's efficiency in curbing freedom fighting activities of the Indians came in for praise from Lord Edward Robert Lytton, the then Governor of Bengal. He was awarded the KCIE in 1937. In view of his expertise, the British sent him to the British Mandate of Palestine to advise the Inspector General on matters of security, where he arrived on October 21, 1938. In due course he advised the construction of a large number of reinforced concrete police stations and posts which could be defended against attack and the construction of a Frontier fence along the northern border of Palestine to control the movement of insurgents, goods and weapons. His recommendations were accepted and something like fifty new "Tegart forts" [1]as they came to be known were built throughout Palestine. He also imported Doberman dogs from South Africa and established an interrogation center in Jerusalem to train interrogators in torture. It is recorded that suspects underwent brutal questioning, involving humiliation, beating, and the Turkish practice of hitting prisoners on the soles of their feet and genitals.

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[edit] Further reading

  • Tutun Mukherjee, Colonialism, Surveillance and Memoirs of travel: Tegart's Diaries and the Andaman Cellular Jail, in Sachidananda Mohanty (ed.) Travel Writing and the Empire, Katha (paperback 2004) ISBN 81-87649-36-4 - reviewed in The Hindu, September 7, 2003 accessed at [2] September 15, 2006

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ Article on Tegart forts: Anton La Guardia, Jericho Jail Creates Own Modern History, LA Times, reproduced in Arab News, March 24, 2006 accessed at [1] September 15, 2006

[edit] Archive sources

  • Sir Charles Tegart Collection, held at St Antony's College, Oxford University: contents listed at [3]
Police appointments
Preceded by
Sir Reginald Clarke		 Police Commissioner of Calcutta
1923–1931		 Succeeded by
L. H. Colson
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