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This thesis examines the impact of colonial legal institutions planted by the British administration upon the working of local indigenous practices in Bengal from 1860 to 1914. The aim of the thesis is two-fold. Firstly, the aim is to highlight the constraints and limitations faced by institutions that were reorganised following the assumption of Crown control in 1858. Secondly, the purpose is to illustrate the ways in which these limitations allowed the native population to mould, and manipulate, state institutions according to local needs and expectations. By examining these issues the aim is to highlight the tenuous relationship between western methods and indigenous practices, at times complementing each other and at other times proving to be incompatible. Through an examination of the system of criminal administration, the thesis seeks to highlight the complexities of the interaction between the local populace and colonial law. Rather than representing rigid categories which highlighted the difference between coloniser and colonised, the system of criminal administration was often the site where boundaries would often become blurred. As the thesis will aim to demonstrate through specific scenarios and cases described both in private memoirs and official records, it was a site which would be shaped by a number of influences- from clashing interests and changing alliances amongst local groups to the conflicting objectives of the colonial rulers themselves. In the process individual agencies were asserted that confound simplistic characterisations of the impact of colonialism in this important region within the British Indian empire.

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The thesis examines the contemporary Bengali practice of worshipping clay images. By clay is understood 'unbaked' clay. The thesis makes a distinction between 'baked clay' (terracotta) images and 'unbaked' clay (terracruda) images and examines the preference for worshipping terracruda images. The worship of clay images is examined within the context of image worship in general in India, referring to the classical iconographical canons and other texts in which clay is mentioned as a suitable medium for the making of religious icons. The study is restricted to the Hindu religion. The thesis does not restrict itself to a purely iconographical approach. The thesis discusses the artistic tradition that gave rise to the clay images of Bengal,as well as attempting to understand the religious significance of the images. In tracing the tradition, the author has used vernacular sources as well as early records of travellers. In describing the contemporary technique of clay image making, the author has relied on recorded interviews and photo-documentation taken during a three month period of fieldwork in West Bengal. The thesis establishes that there has been a tradition of worshipping clay images in Bengal that is at least two centuries old and suggests that there are earlier precedents for the tradition. It also concludes that it is a strongly regional tradition that developed in Bengal and influenced the neighbouring states of Bihar, Assam and Orissa. The worship of terracruda images in Bengal is a regional practice that is the product of both classical and 'folk' influences.