Sir John Strachey GCSI CIE (5 June 1823 – 19 December 1907) was a British civil servant and writer in India who served as Lieutenant-Governor of the North-Western Provinces from 1874 to 1876.

After passing through the East India Company College, Strachey entered the Bengal civil service in 1842, and served in the North-Western Provinces, occupying a number of important positions.

In 1866, he became Chief Commissioner of Oudh, having been chosen by Lord Lawrence to remedy as far as possible the injustice done after the Indian rebellion of 1857 by the confiscation of the rights of tenants and small proprietors of land, maintaining at the same time the privileges of the Talukdars of great landlords.

In 1876, by request of Lord Lytton and the secretary of state, he consented to relinquish that office, and returned to the governor-general's council as financial minister, which post he retained until 1880.

The removal of all import duties, including those on English cotton goods, and the establishment of complete free trade, was declared to be the fixed policy of the government, and this was in great measure carried into effect before 1880, when Strachey left India.

The tablet is located in the south-east corner of the Machchi Bhawan ('Fish Quarters'), very close to the Saman Burj (Jasmine Tower), from which Mughal Emperor Shah Jahan gazed east across the River Yamuna to his creation, the Taj Mahal.

to whom, not forgetting the enlightened sympathy and timely care of others India is mainly indebted for the rescued and preserved beauty of the Taj Mahal and other famous monuments of the ancient art and history of provinces formerly administered by him This tablet is placed by order of his friend the Earl of Lytton Viceroy and Governor General of India A.D. 1880 During his period as Lieutenant-Governor of the North-Western Provinces Strachey directed restoration of the Machchi Bhawan and the nearby Diwan-i-Am (Hall of Audience), which had been subject to looting by the East India Company in the early British colonial period.