'A Grandfather's Tale: Memoirs being mainly concerned with service in the Indian Army and the Indian Political Service in India and the Persian Gulf from 1932-1947' [‎45r] (89/118)

In Bahrain itself the work was interesting and extremely varied. A
lot of time was spent dealing with the problems of the Bahrain Arabian Petroleum
Company, commonly known as BAPCO. Besides employing a great deal of local
labour the company had aoout twelve hundred assorted Americans, Australians,
Canadians, English, Irish and Scots, ranging from high powered company
executives to extremely tough roughneck oil—drillers. There were also frequent
visitations from the American Oil base at Dhahran, on the Saudi Arabian coast,
which was only twenty miles away by launch. Saudi Arabia then, as now. enforced
total prohibition whereas Bahrain did not, at least for Europeans and Americans,
and I can recall at least one case of an American coming across from Dhahran on
a Friday, spending the entire week-end in the Bar at Banco, and being carried on
to the launch to return to Arabia on the following Monday. Other less sordid
and more mundane problems, concerned visas and passports, which the Political
Agent, Bahrain, was empowered to issue. The advent of the new British nationality-
law in, I think 19^6, made things much more complicated for Canadians,
Australians and Irish, and I remember that a day after the new law came into
force a Southern Irishman came into my office asking for a visa and I had to tell
him that he would have to apply to Dublin for it. Two days before I could have
given it.
Bahrain was the great trading centre of the Gulf in those days, as it
was an Island under British protection, and merchants knew that it was politically
stable. It served as the entrepot for many traders in the other Gulf States,
and made a great deal of money from this transit trading, more, in fact, than
it made from oil or from pearling, though both the latter were flourishing.
In Bahrain there were three types of Court, the Sheikh's Court, the
Joint Court and the Political Agent A mid-ranking political representative (equivalent to a Consul) from the diplomatic corps of the Government of India or one of its subordinate provincial governments, in charge of a Political Agency. 's Court. The first one dealt with all
cases concerning Bahraini subjects only, the second with cases where one party
was a Bharaini and one a foreigner and the third when only foreigners were
concerned. The Political Agent A mid-ranking political representative (equivalent to a Consul) from the diplomatic corps of the Government of India or one of its subordinate provincial governments, in charge of a Political Agency. was ex-officio District and Sessions Judge,
while the Assistant Political Agent A mid-ranking political representative (equivalent to a Consul) from the diplomatic corps of the Government of India or one of its subordinate provincial governments, in charge of a Political Agency. had the powers of a District Magistrate.
As far as I recall the Political Agent A mid-ranking political representative (equivalent to a Consul) from the diplomatic corps of the Government of India or one of its subordinate provincial governments, in charge of a Political Agency. rarely tried any cases himself, a nd'
delegated nearly all Court work to the A.P.A., and as A.P.A. I used to act as
his representative in the Joint Court sitting together with one of the Sheikh's
family. Happily there were not a great deal of criminal or civil cases for me
to try, and the joint court system worked very well. Most of the cases in the
P. A's Court concerned Bapco personnel and were of a fairly minor nature,
such as assaults, drunkenness or petty theft.
The one really serious case I dealt with later on, when I was
officiating as Political Agent A mid-ranking political representative (equivalent to a Consul) from the diplomatic corps of the Government of India or one of its subordinate provincial governments, in charge of a Political Agency. and Sessions Judge, was of murder by a Persian
of a non-Bharaini Arab. There was no jury but I sat with two Assessors who
could express an opinion but had no vote. Fortunately it was a simple case.
The accused had stabbed the other man in broad daylight, in the Bazaar, in
front of a number of witnesses, and had killed him without apparent provocation.
The victim had been unarmed. In the circumstances I had no hesitation in
finding him guilty of murder, a verdict with which both the Assessors concurred,
and the punishment had to be death. This sentence, however, was subject to
confirmation by the Viceroy, and before this came through, some two months