How the British saw Education

The tradition of Orientalism

In 1783, William Jones arrived in Calcutta, appointed as a junior judge at the Supreme Court. Jones was a linguist who had studied Greek and Latin at Oxford and knew French, English, Arabic and Persian. At Calcutta, he learnt the subtleties of Sanskrit language, grammar and poetry from pandits. He also studied ancient Indian texts on law, philosophy, religion, politics, morality, arithmetic, medicine and the other sciences.

Henry Thomas Colebrooke and Nathaniel Halhed were also interested in the ancient Indian heritage, to master the Indian languages and to translate Sanskrit and Persian works into English. Jones along with them set up the Asiatic Society of Bengal and started a journal called Asiatick Researches.

Jones and Colebrooke felt that the Indian civilisation had attained its glory in the ancient past, but had subsequently declined. To understand India better, it was necessary to discover the sacred and legal texts that were produced in the ancient period. Jones and Colebrooke went on discovering ancient texts, understanding their meaning, translating them, and making their findings known to others. This project will help Indians rediscover their own heritage, and understand the lost glories of their past.

The Company officials felt that institutions should encourage the study of ancient Indian texts and Sanskrit and Persian literature and poetry. Hindus and Muslims should learn what they were already familiar with, and what they valued and treasured.

In 1781, a madrasa was set up in Calcutta to promote the study of Arabic, Persian and Islamic law; and the Hindu College was established in Benaras in 1791 to encourage the study of ancient Sanskrit texts that would be useful for the administration of the country.

“Grave errors of the East”

The British officials started criticising the Orientalist vision of learning and said that knowledge of the East was full of errors and unscientific thought. Eastern literature was non-serious and light-hearted. James Mill was one of those who attacked the Orientalists. The aim of education should be to teach what was useful and practical. So Indians should be familiar with the scientific and technical advances that the West had made.

Thomas Babington Macaulay saw India as an uncivilised country that needed to be civilised. He urged that the British government in India should stop wasting public money in promoting Oriental learning, for it was of no practical use. Macaulay thought English language would help Indians to read some of the finest literature the world had produced; make them aware of the developments in Western science and philosophy. The English Education Act of 1835 was introduced and English was made the medium of instruction for higher education. English textbooks began to be produced for schools.

Education for commerce

In 1854, the Court of Directors of the East India Company in London sent an educational dispatch to the Governor-General in India. It was issued by Charles Wood, the President of the Board of Control of the Company, known as Wood’s Despatch. It draws an outline of the educational policy that was to be followed in India, and emphasised on the practical benefits of a system of European learning, as opposed to Oriental knowledge.

European learning would enable Indians to recognise the advantages of the expansion of trade and commerce and the importance of developing the resources of the country. By adopting European ways of life, their tastes and desires would change. European learning would improve the moral character of Indians.

The British introduced several measures, following the 1854 Despatch. Education departments of the government were set up to extend control over all matters regarding education. Steps were taken to establish a system of university education. In 1857, universities were being established in Calcutta, Madras and Bombay. Attempts were also made to bring about changes within the system of school education.

What Happened to the Local Schools?

The report of William Adam

In the 1830s, William Adam toured the districts of Bengal and Bihar and had been asked by the Company to report on the progress of education in vernacular schools.

According to the report presented by Adam, over 1 lakh, pathshalas were present in Bengal and Bihar with no more than 20 students each. These institutions were set up by wealthy people, or the local community. The education system was flexible with no fixed fee, no printed books, no separate school building, no benches or chairs, no blackboards, no system of separate classes, no roll call registers, no annual examinations, and no regular time-table.

Classes were held under a banyan tree, in the corner of a village shop or temple, or at the guru’s home. School fees depended on the income of the parents: the rich had to pay more than the poor. The guru decided what to teach, orally in accordance with the needs of the students. Students were sat together in one place and the guru interacted separately with groups of children with different levels of learning.

This flexible system was suited to local needs. During the harvest time classes were not held. The pathshala started once again when the crops had been cut and stored.

New routines, new rules

The Company was concerned primarily with higher education. After 1854 the Company decided to improve the system of vernacular education by introducing order within the system, imposing routines, establishing rules, ensuring regular inspections.

The Company appointed a number of government pandits, gave them charge of four to five schools. The task of the pandit was to visit the pathshalas and try and improve the standard of teaching. Each guru was asked to submit periodic reports and take classes according to a regular timetable. Teaching was based on textbooks and learning was to be tested through a system of annual examination. Students were asked to pay a regular fee, attend regular classes, sit on fixed seats, and obey the new rules of discipline.

Pathshalas which accepted the new rules were supported through government grants. The consequence of new rules and routines was earlier children from poor peasant families had been able to go to pathshalas, since the timetable was flexible. The new system demanded regular attendance, even during harvest time when children of poor families had to work in the fields.

The Agenda for a National Education

Before the British officials, many thinkers from different parts of India began to talk of the need for a wider spread of education. Some Indians felt that Western education would help modernise India and urged the British to open more schools, colleges and universities, and spend more money on education. There were other Indians who reacted against Western education. Mahatma Gandhi and Rabindranath Tagore were two such individuals.

“English education has enslaved us”

According to Mahatma Gandhi, Western civilisation created a sense of inferiority in the minds of Indians. It made the Indians perceive it as superior and destroyed the pride they had in their own culture. Indians educated in these institutions began admiring British rule. Mahatma Gandhi wanted an education that could help Indians recover their sense of dignity and self-respect. During the national movement, he urged students to leave educational institutions in order to show to the British that Indians were no longer willing to be enslaved.

Education in English distanced Indians from their own social surroundings, and made them “strangers in their own lands”. Mahatma Gandhi said that education ought to develop a person’s mind and soul. Literacy did not count as education. As nationalist sentiments spread, other thinkers also began thinking of a system of national education, which would be radically different from that set up by the British.

Tagore’s “abode of peace”

Rabindranath Tagore started Shantiniketan in 1901. During his childhood days, he found school suffocating and oppressive. So, after growing up he wanted to establish a school where the child was happy, free and creative, and able to explore his own thoughts and desires. He felt that childhood ought to be a time of self-learning, outside the rigid and restricting discipline of the schooling system set up by the British. According to Tagore, the existing schools killed the natural desire of the child to be creative, along with his sense of wonder.

Tagore said that creative learning could be encouraged only within a natural environment. Gandhiji was against Western civilisation and its worship of machines and technology. Tagore, on the other hand, wanted to combine elements of modern Western civilisation with the best Indian tradition. He emphasised the need to teach science and technology at Shantiniketan, along with art, music and dance.

Many individuals and thinkers were thinking of a way as to how the national educational system could be fashioned. Some wanted changes within the system set up by the British and felt that the system could be extended to include wider sections of people. Others urged that alternative systems be created so that people were educated into a culture that was truly national.

• William Jones -> respect for indian cultures.
• Rabindranath Tagore -> learning in a natural environment.
• Thomas Macaulay -> Promotion of English Education
• Mahatma Gandhi -> Critical of English Education
• Pathshalas -> A place of learning by Gurus
• Linguist -> A person who knows and studies several languages
• Orientalists -> People who have scholarly knowldge of the language and culture of Asia
• Munshi ->  A person who can read write and teach persian.
• Vernacular - > A local language.
• Wood's Despatch ->  An order brought from England to India by Wood.

Q: Why did William Jones feel the need to study Indian history, philosophy and law?
Answer:

• William Jones came to represent a particular attitude towards India. He shared a deep respect for ancient cultures, both of India and of the West.
• Jones and Colebrooke felt that India had attained its glory in the ancient past. It declined later on. In order to understand India, it was necessary to discover the sacred and legal texts produced in the past.
• These texts would reveal the ideas and laws of Hindus and Muslims and would form the basis of future development.
• Jones and Colebrooke believed that their project would help the British learn from Indian culture. Indians would also rediscover their own heritage. In this way the British would become guardians and masters of Indian culture.

Q. Why did James Mill and Thomas Macaulay think that European education was essential in India?
Answer:

• James Mill was the strongest critic of the Orientalists.
• He declared that the British should not teach what the natives wanted, or what they respected, in order to please them and “win a place in their heart”.
• The £pm of education should be to teach what was useful and practical.
• Indians should be made familiar with the scientific and technical advances that the West had made, and not the sacred literature of the Orient.
• Macaulay urged the British government in India to stop wasting public money in promoting Oriental learning, for it had no practical use.
• He felt that knowledge of English would allow Indians to read some of the finest literature the world had produced; it would make them aware of the developments in Western science and philosophy.
• The teaching of English could thus be a way of civilizing people, changing their tastes, values, and culture.

Q.Why did Mahatma Gandhi want to teach children handicrafts?
Answer:
Mahatma Gandhi wanted to teach children handicraft because of the following reasons:

• People would work with their hands.
• The craft would develop their minds.
• It would also develop their capacities to understand.

Q. Why did Mahatma Gandhi think that English education had enslaved Indians?
Answer:

1. According to Mahatma Gandhi, colonial education created a sense of inferiority in the minds of Indians. He said it made them see Western civilisation as superior which destroyed the pride they had in their own culture.
   He said: It was sinful—it enslaved Indians—it cast an evil spell on them.
2. Charmed by the West, appreciating everything that came from the West, Indians educated in these institutions admired British rule.
3. Mahatma Gandhi wanted an education that could help Indians recover their sense of dignity and self-respect.
4. Mahatma Gandhi -strongly was in favour of Indian languages to be the medium of teaching.
5. Education in English crippled Indians and distanced them from their own social surroundings. This made them “straneers in their own lands”. Speaking a foreign tongue (language) despised local culture.
6. Mahatma Gandhi further said that western education focused on reading and writing rather than oral knowledge;
   • It valued textbooks rather than life experience and practical knowledge.
   • He said education should develop a person’s mind and soul.
   • Literacy or simply learning to read and write—by itself did not count as education.
7. People had to work with their hands and learn a craft. They should know how different things operated.

Q. Find out from your grandparents about what they studied in school.
Answer:

• Urdu/Hindi language
• Mathematics
• Social study, Drawing.

Q.Find out about the history of your school or any other school in the area you live.
Answer:
I study in St. Peters Acadamy. It is the oldest one in this region. It was established by a Christian Missionary in 1980. It has created many histories by achieving so many events to its credit. The Principal is always appointed by the missionary. The man of high academic repute and administrative quality is appointed here as Principal. Teachers are also of high talent. There are five thousand students. Its students always bring high laurels to school and region by achieving bright result in Board Examinations. I am proud of my school.

MCQs:

Question 1.
Choose the correct option.
(i) The ideas of William Jones were supported by
(a) James Mill
(b) Thomas Macaulay
(c) Charles Wood
(d) Henry Thomas Colebrooke

(ii) A madrasa was set up in Calcutta in 1781 to promote the study of
(a) Urdu
(b) Arabic
(c) Ancient history of India
(d) Muslim religion

(b) Thomas Macaulay
(c) Both (a) to (b)
(d) None of the above

(iv) The name associated with the establishment of Serampore Mission
(a) Thomas Macaulay
(b) Henry Thomas Colebrooke
(c) William Carey
(d) William Jones

(v) William Adam toured the districts of
(a) Bihar and Orissa
(b) Bihar and Bengal
(c) Bengal and Rajasthan
(d) Orissa and Madhya Pradesh
Answer:
(i) (d), (ii) (b), (iii) (c), (iv) (c), (v) (b).

Question 2.
Fill in the blanks with appropriate words to complete each sentence.

1. Warren Hastings took the initiative to set up the Calcutta ………… and believed that ancient customs of the country and ……………..of learning ought to be the basis of ………… rule in India.
2. Thomas Macaulay saw India as an …………… country that needed to be.
3. Together with Henry Thomas Colebrooke and Nathaniel Halhed, Jones set up the ……………. of Bengal, and started a journal called …………………
4. Many British officials said that knowledge of the was full of errors and thought …………….
5. There was no system of annual examinations in …………..
6. Rabindranath Tagore started …………… in 1901.

Answer:

1. Madrasa, customs, oriental
2. uncivilised, civilised
3. Asiatic Society, Asiaticle Researches
4. East, unscientific
5. Pathshalas
6. Shantiniketan

Question 3.
State whether each of the following statements is True or False.

1. Wood’s Despatch emphasised the practical benefits of a system of European learning.
2. Mahatma Gandhi never approved English education in India.
3. Rabindranath Tagore did a lot for the spread of English education in India.
4. Pathshalas followed strict rules and regulations.
5. Thomas Macaulay was in favour of the promotion of Oriental institutions.
6. James Mills was a Scottish missionary who toured the districts of Bengal and Bihar.
7. Tagore set up his school, Le. Shantirdketan in a rural setting.

Answer:

1. True
2. True
3. False
4. False
5. False
6. False
7. True.

Question 4.
Match the hems given in Column A correctly with those given in Column B.

Answer:
(i) (c), (ii) (a), (iii) (e), (iv) (b), (v) (d).

Very Short Answer Type Questions

Question 1.
Name the different languages that William Jones studied.
Answer:
Greek, Latin, English, French, Arabic and Persian.

Question 2.
Why was Calcutta Madrasa set up?
Answer:
Calcutta Madrasa was set up to promote the study of Arabic, Persian and Islamic law.

Question 3.
Why was the Hindu College established in Benaras?
Answer:
The Hindu College was established in Benaras to encourage the study of ancient Sanskrit texts that would be useful for the. administration of the country.

Question 4.
Name two individuals who sharply attacked the Orientalists.
Answer:
James Mill and Thomas Babington Macaulay.

Question 5.
What did Thomas Macaulay urge the British government in India?
Answer:
Thomas Macaulay urged the British government in India to stop wasting public money in promoting Oriental learning for it was of no practical use.

Question 6.
How were Oriental institutions like the Calcutta Madrasa and Benaras Sanskrit College viewed by the British?
Answer:
These Oriental institutions were viewed as temples of darkness that were falling of themselves into decay.

Question 7.
Name the places where the British established universities.
Answer:
Calcutta, Madras and Bombay.

Question 8.
Where were classes held under the system of pathshalas?
Answer:
Classes were held under a banyan tree or in the comer of a village shop or temple or at the guru’s home.

Question 9.
What type of education was given to the children in pathshalas?
Answer:
Children were given oral education in pathshalas.

Question 10.
Why were classes not held during harvest time?
Answer:
It was because rural children had to work in the fields during harvest time.

Question 11 .
What task was assigned to the pandit by the Company?
Answer:
The Company assigned the pandit to visit the pathshalas and try to improve the standard of teaching.

Question 12 .
Name two Indians who reacted against Western education.
Answer:
Mahatma Gandhi and Rabindranath Tagore.

Question 13 .
What do you mean by Tagore’s abode of peace?
Answer:
Tagore’s Shantmiketan was established in a rural setting, 100 kilometres away from Calcutta. As it was far from the din and bustle of the city it was an abode of peace.

Question 14.
How did Tagore view his school namely Shantmiketan?
Answer:
He viewed his school as an abode of peace where living in harmony with nature, children would cultivate their natural creativity.

Short Answer Type Questions

Question 1.
Why did many Company officials in India want to promote Indian rather than Western learning?
Answer:
Many Company officials felt that institutions should be set up to encourage the study of ancient Indian texts and teach Sanskrit and Persian literature and poetry. These officials were of the opinion that Hindus and Muslims ought to be taught what they were already familiar with and what they valued and preserved, not subjects that were alien to them. They believed that only by doing this the British could win the hearts of the Indians, only then they could expect to be respected by their subjects.

Question 2.
What were the views of other Company officials?
Answer:
Other Company officials did not approve the ideas of the Orientalists. They began to criticise the Orientalist- vision of learning. They saved that the knowledge of the East was full of errors and unscientific thought. They saw Eastern literature as non-serious and light-hearted. So, they argued that it was wrong on the part of the British to spend so much effort in encouraging the study of Arabic and Sanskrit language and literature.