A TO Z INDIA - NOVEMBER 2021

A TO Z INDIA ● NOVEMBER 2021 ● PAGE 11
The Story of oppression, audacity and determination:
India’s and Asia’s first newspaper - The Story of Hicky’s Bengal Gazette
Santha
to hire messengers to hand-deliver the copies to offset his postal ban. As the voice against tyranny and
despotism, his paper gained a cult following amongst the subaltern of Calcutta. This unexpected public
support injected Hicky with a fresh dose of adrenaline. He was getting bolder by the day, and the gloves
were irreversibly off now. Hicky now took a clear political stand and announced his determination to
dismantle Hastings’ autocracy, again, without directly naming the latter. James Hicky was flirting with
persecution now. Many others had gone down this road in the past and ended up destroyed.
But none could shake his conviction. Hastings had to go. His Gazette was now a vehicle of free speech and
revolution, a sharp departure from his original stance against political journalism. The paper no longer gave
prominence to civic issues. Instead, it was now obsessed with Hastings and his cohorts.
Hicky started dragging the Company over hot coals for corruption and nepotism. His resentment was no
longer a matter of personal grudge, he had become the unofficial political bullhorn of the oppressed. “No
taxation without representation” became his other battle cry. He genuinely believed all men had equal rights
and those rights were unalienable. Of course, by all men he meant all White men.
1782 would see the end of a seven-year war between the Company and the Marathas, the First Anglo-
Maratha War. The Marathas won this round. Thousands of soldiers had been sent to their slaughter to fulfill
the Governor-General’s pipe-dream of absolute dominance. Hicky not only criticized this move, he even
crossed the line to start making extremely personal attacks on Hastings. If there was anything worse than
sedition in Company Rule, it was insolence. Calling a sitting Governor-General names like “the Great Mogul”
and “Clive’s miserable successor” amounted to just that.
Hicky carried on unperturbed. In the March 31 edition of Hicky’s Bengal Gazette, he dropped another bomb.
In a front-page feature article, Hicky accused Johann Zacharias Kiernander of embezzlement and fraud.
Kiernander was an extremely well-connected clergyman from Sweden who had come to Calcutta as the first
Protestant missionary in Bengal. Hicky accused Kiernander of desecrating the Church by making money off
its property. He also accused him of stealing funds meant for orphan kids. These were grave accusations
against a “man of God.” Bengal Gazette now carried unambiguous calls for mutiny. He challenged the sepoys
to disobey Hastings as Hastings broke Company rules. He started seeing himself as the Governor-General’s
biggest nemesis. Perhaps the latter saw him thus too. Hicky’s stance quickly went from advocacy to
provocation. On June 12, 1781, James Augustus Hicky was arrested on charges of libel. The suit had been
brought by the most powerful man on the subcontinent, Warren Hastings. Hicky’s bail was set for 40,000
rupees. The man made less than half that amount in a year, so he failed to pay. And once again, after four
eventful years, Hicky found himself in a Calcutta prison. He did continue to print from jail for a while, but
eventually, he ran out of funds and could print no more. On March 30, 1782, Calcutta received the last
edition of Hicky’s Bengal Gazette. Hicky was released from prison two years later but never went back to
printing again. Having lived the rest of his life in relative poverty and anonymity, James Augustus Hicky died
at sea eighteen years after stepping out of that prison. Thus ends the story of not just India’s but Asia’s first
newspaper.