The West Bengal Practice and Procedure Manual 1943
Published under the authority of the Board of Revenue, West Bengal
Superintendent, Government Printing,
West Bengal Government Press, Alipore, West Bengal 1944
THE BENGAL RECORDS MANUAL 1943
Preamble
NOTE 1.—The instructions contained in this Manual apply primarily to the offices of Collectors and their Subordinates, but they should be followed as far as possible, in all offices subordinate to Government.
NOTE 2.—The record-room at district headquarters will be under the charge of a Deputy Collector who will be called the record-room Deputy Collector; but in special cases it or the copying section of it may be placed in charge of a Sub-Deputy Collector. Whenever this is done, the term Deputy Collector in the Manual should be held to signify also Sub-Deputy Collector. The Deputy Collector or the Sub-Deputy Collector will be held responsible for the proper working of the record-room and the copying department in accordance with the rules of the Records Manual, in addition to the daily supervision of the record-room and staff he will each half-year make a thorough inspection. A note-book will be kept in the record-room in which all important orders will be entered. The six monthly inspection notes will be kept in a separate inspection register. In both the English and the Vernacular record-rooms should be hung up a list, to be kept up to date, showing who
have been in charge, as Deputy Collector and Record-keeper of the record-room, and the duration of their charge.
CHAPTER I. ENGLISH RECORDS
CHAPTER II. VERNACULAR RECORDS.
CHAPTER III. Subdivisional Records.
Chapter III A. Preservation and destruction of Birth and Death Registers
CHAPTER V.
A.—Rules relating to the destruction of exhibits or private documents.
CHAPTER IV.
A.—Miscellaneous.
CHAPTER VI. Record grant and record-room receipts
CHAPTER VII Library.
CHAPTER VIII. Rules for the supply of copies of, and information respecting, papers and
documents in district offices.
English records
English records will be classified on the same principle as vernacular papers. Class A will contain papers to be permanently preserved, class B will contain papers to be destroyed after twelve years, and class C will contain papers that need not be kept for more than two years excluding the years of disposal.
Records to be retained forever
Correspondence of importance regarding
1.
Settlement.
Surveys.
Waste lands.
Embankments.
Irrigation.
Drainage.
Government estates.
Escheats. Endowments.
Stamp s—Resumptions. Boundaries.
Partitions.
Redemptions. Transfers.
Remissions and abatements.
Customs.
Opium.
Salt.
Excise.
Assessed taxes.
Jurisdiction.
Land registration of Common and
special registration.
Malikana.
Civil suits.
Service tenures.
Sales.
Enhancement of rent.
Court of Wards and other private estates
managed by the Collector.
Land improvement.
Land Acquisition.
Road and Public Works
Cess.
Statistics.
Forest conservancy.
Floods.
Famines.
Titles conferred by the Government of
India.
Pensions.
Appeals, where the question is one of
permanent interest.
All annual reports “and returns.
2
All resolutions on those returns.
All circulars from Government, the Board, Legal Remembrancer, Accountant-General, etc.
All letters communicating rules and general instructions.
Correspondence on other subjects of importance to be included at Collector’s discretion.
All aid correspondence already bound up in books.
All printed reports and books including regulations and laws.
All maps and survey records.
All lists of papers destroyed.
Statistical tables and memoranda for the preparation of Annual Reports.
The following papers appertaining to the Excise and Salt Department: —
History sheet.
The following- records appertaining, to the Cess Department:—
Annual budgets and establishment returns.
Quarterly and kistwar returns.
District and Sub divisional Officers’ confidential notebook (prescribed in Government
order No. 42Misc, dated 25th November 1908).
Papers regarding landed property held by gazette officers.
Papers regarding the establishment of a pound or a ferry.
Papers regarding juvenile offenders.
Papers regarding under-trial prisoners.
