A week later, on 4 July 1763, the Council in Calcutta formally declared war on Mir Qasim. As a measure of their cynicism, they voted to put back on the throne his elderly father-in-law, the former Nawab, Mir Jafar. The latter had used his retirement to become a fully fledged opium addict and was now even more befuddled than before. As careless with the state finances as ever, the old Nawab promised to reimburse the Company up to Rs5 million* for the expense of fighting his ambitious son-in-law.
