Abolish the moneylender, and the general body of cultivators would have nothing to depend upon but the harvest of a single year.
Owing to the silladar system, under which the Indian sowar provided his own horse and provender in return for a monthly wage, the Indian cavalry were almost to a man in debt, and therefore favoured any attempt to upset the existing regime, and with it to wipe out the moneylender and his books; and the general enlistment order passed in July 1856, for the purposes of the war in Persia, made the Hindu sepoys afraid of losing caste by crossing the sea.
If any money-lender, or any manager, agent or clerk of a moneylender, or any person being a director, manager or other officer of a corporation carrying on the business of a money-lender, by any false, misleading or deceptive statement, representation or promise, or by any dishonest concealment of material facts, fraudulently induces, or attempts to induce, any person to borrow money or to agree to the terms on which money is to be borrowed, he is declared by the act to be guilty of a misdemeanour and is liable on indictment to imprisonment with or without hard labour for a term not exceeding two years, or to a fine not exceeding five hundred pounds, or to both.
Owing to the silladar system, under which the native cavalry provided their own horses and accoutrements, many of the sowars were in debt, and were in favour of a change which would wipe out the existing regime and with it the moneylender.