WITH MUMBAI slated to get a Mayor on February 11, another position which was part of Mumbai’s history now remains lost with the post of the Sheriff of Mumbai vacant since the last appointee in 2009.
While there has been no formal announcement of it being discontinued, the post has been vacant for the past 16 years and since then a law officer is given the additional charge of the Deputy Sheriff to carry out legal responsibilities, part of the Law and Judiciary Department.
“When the Sheriff was appointed, the Power of Attorney to perform these judicial functions was given to the Deputy Sheriff, while the social functions like receiving or seeing off VIPs or foreign dignitaries on a visit to the city, organising condolence meetings for the demise of renowned citizens, were done by the Sheriff. With no appointment made since 2009, the social functions have been discontinued, while the judicial work is carried out by the office,” said an official of the Sheriff’s office.
Similar posts in Chennai and Kolkata too have not seen appointments for many years.
Prominent appointees
A large wooden board in the Office, listing out over 100 Sheriffs, who held office from 1897 to 2009, is the only sign of the post which held ceremonial importance. The non-political, titular position was appointed for a tenure of one year-from December 20 to December 19, on the recommendation of the Governor and the Chief Minister.
During British rule, it was a post similar to the manner in which High Sheriffs were appointed in England, to attend royal visits, maintenance of loyalty of subjects to the Crown.
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Before Independence, the Sheriffs were appointed by the Governor and Council of Bombay, with a limited establishment to aid magisterial work.
The first Sheriff of Bombay was George Cotton, and the third in 1898 was Adam Peerbhai, a Dawoodi Bohra philanthropist. For a few years then, the post was filled with Britisher, industrialists and traders from India and prominent Parsi community members like Cowasji Jehangir. Independent India’s first Sheriff was a woman, Mithan Jamshed Lam, an Indian lawyer and activist. Subsequently, the post saw appointments of lawyers, teachers, journalists and businesspersons and philanthropists. Cricketer Vijay Merchant was appointed as the Sheriff in 1970; actor Dilip Kumar in 1980; actor Sunil Dutt in 1982; nuclear scientist Homi Sethna in 1991; cricketer Sunil Gavaskar in 1995.
Work done by Sheriffs
Since the Sheriff was an honorary post, the work done was voluntary with no salary drawn. Officials said that there was usually no remuneration or payment for expenses towards the events organised by the Sheriff in their capacity. Records of the Raj Bhavan and Governor’s Office show programmes like a Sarvajanik Holi event organised at Shivaji Park in 1989, condolence meetings held in 1969, after the death of oncologist Dr Ernest Borges and Parsi businessman Homi Mody. But officials said that such meetings and events had to be organised by the Sheriff on their own or through their contacts with no remuneration as it was considered a prestigious non-political position for an eminent citizen.
An official said that for a few years a car, a Hindustani Contessa, was provided to the Sheriff, with a flag on its bonnet, but once the car became unusable, no new car was allotted and the appointee usually used their personal car, even for social events as a Sheriff.
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Some Sheriffs were noted for their work during their tenure.
Fakhruddin Khorakiwala, a businessman, and founder of Akbarallys, a chain of departmental stores in Mumbai, was the Sheriff in 1993, when the city saw communal violence.
A project to set up citizen police committees in the 72 police stations in the city at that time, known later as mohalla committees, engaging neighbourhoods in maintaining peace, was envisioned by him. Leela Moolgaokar, a social worker, and wife of industrialist Sumant Moolgaokar, of Tata Motors, worked with women prisoners during her term in 1976.
The last Sheriff, Indu Shahani, former Principal of H R College of Commerce and Economics, worked on a helpline for women, formed Sheriff’s Brigade for enrolling students for voluntary work like clean-up drives with a Blow the Whistle campaign.
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She also worked with municipal schools, sending their principals to visits abroad for training, through grants from companies. Shahani said that since there was no remuneration aspect to the honorary post, a lot depended on the reputation of the Sheriff to be able to galvanise support from the masses and other institutions for organising campaigns for citizens.
“I was very fortunate that I was in the field of education and had a battery of students from all over Mumbai whose support I could galvanise for programmes through the Sheriff’s Brigade, founded during my tenure for campaigns like Green Mumbai, Clean Mumbai. Now there are also service programs in colleges like National Service Scheme and mandatory Corporate Social Responsibility,” Shahani said.
