Letters Patent of Queen Victoria

THE LETTERS PATENT

The LETTERS PATENT issued by Queen Victoria to establish the High Courts in British India: (28th December 1865):

Victoria, by the Grace of God, of the United Kingdom of Great Britain, and Ireland, Queen, Defender of Parliament passed in the twenty-fourth and twenty-fifth years of Our Reign entitled “An Act for establishing High Courts of Judicature in India,” it was, amongst other things, enacted that it should be lawful for Her Majesty, by Letters of Patent under the Great Seal of the United Kingdom, to erect and establish, a High Court of Judicature at Madras, for the Presidency of Madras aforesaid, and that such High Court should consist of a Chief Justice and as many Judges, not exceeding 15, as Her Majesty might, from time to time, think fit to appoint, who should be selected from among persons qualified as in the said Act is declared:

PROVIDED always that the persons who at the time of the establishment of such High Court were Judges of the Supreme Court of Judicature and permanent Judges of the Court of Sudder Dewany Adawlut or Sudder Adawlut, of the same Presidency, should be and become Judges of such High Court, without further appointment for that purpose, and the Chief Justice of such Supreme Court should become the Chief Justice of such High Court, and that upon the establishment Sudder Dewany Adawlut and Faujidarry Adawlut at Madras as in the said Presidency should be abolished.”

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