CDS (I) 2023 General Knowledge · Question 113 of 120

Correct — A, John Lawrence. Two of the four names can be struck out before you think about Simla at all, because neither man ever held the office in the stem. The title of Viceroy was created only in 1858, when the Crown took over from the East India Company; William Bentinck and Lord Dalhousie were Governors-General who had left India before that, so neither could have shifted a Viceroy's Council anywhere. Of the two genuine Viceroys left, it was John Lawrence — Viceroy from 1864 to 1869 — who in 1863 decided to move the summer capital of the British Raj to Shimla, and the hill station was declared the summer capital in 1864. He did it knowing what it cost: the whole administration had to be marched between Calcutta and a town more than 1,600 km away, twice a year, and he defended the arrangement precisely because he thought the government worked better out of the heat.

• (b)Lord Dalhousie — Dalhousie was Governor-General, not Viceroy — his term ended before the office of Viceroy existed. He belongs to the story of annexations, railways and the telegraph, not to the shift to Simla.
• (c)Lord Mayo — Mayo was a genuine Viceroy, but he came after Lawrence and inherited an arrangement already in place. He is the strongest wrong answer here for exactly that reason.
• (d)William Bentinck — Bentinck was Governor-General in the 1830s, decades before the office of Viceroy was created. He is remembered for the ban on sati and for the English education decision, not for moving the seat of government.

From 1864 the Government of India kept two seats — the winter capital in Calcutta and, from about April to October, a summer capital in the hills at Simla. The move was a response to the Indian summer and to the disease environment of the plains, and it made a small Himalayan town the effective centre of imperial decision-making for half of every year, with the whole secretariat, its files and its staff travelling up and back.

The safest route through this question is administrative titles rather than dates. Anything before 1858 is a Governor-General under the Company; after 1858 the same person is Governor-General and Viceroy under the Crown. Applying that rule alone removes Bentinck and Dalhousie and halves the question. Between Lawrence and Mayo, remember that Lawrence's viceroyalty comes first and that the decision belongs to the middle of the 1860s. The arrangement he began lasted until the government moved to the new capital at Delhi, and Simla remained the summer seat long after his own term ended.

• The office of Viceroy was created in 1858, when the Crown assumed direct government of India from the East India Company.
• John Lawrence was Viceroy from 1864 to 1869.
• In 1863 he decided to shift the summer capital of British India to Shimla, and Shimla was declared the summer capital in 1864.
• The move meant transferring the administration twice a year between Calcutta and a town over 1,600 km away.
• William Bentinck and Lord Dalhousie held office as Governors-General before 1858 and never bore the title of Viceroy.

• Treating Governor-General and Viceroy as interchangeable across the whole colonial period.
• Choosing Dalhousie because he is associated with modernising measures of every other kind.
• Assuming the later Viceroy who used Simla most is the one who first moved there.

As a who-did-it-first question on the Simla shift, or inside a chronology item on Viceroys and the administrative changes each is remembered for.

No directly related past PYQ was found.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  The title of Viceroy of India was created in which year?

  • (a)1833
  • (b)1853
  • (c)1858
  • (d)1861

  Answer(c) 1858 — when the Crown took over the government of India from the East India Company, the Governor-General also became Viceroy.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Simla was declared the summer capital of British India in which year?

  • (a)1857
  • (b)1864
  • (c)1877
  • (d)1911

  Answer(b) 1864 — following John Lawrence's decision the previous year to move the summer seat of government there.