Complete works of Swami Abhedananda

by Swami Prajnanananda | 1967 | 318,120 words

Swami Abhedananda was one of the direct disciples of Sri Ramakrishna Paramhamsa and a spiritual brother of Swami Vivekananda. He deals with the subject of spiritual unfoldment purely from the yogic standpoint. These discourses represent a study of the Social, Religious, Cultural, Educational and Political aspects of India. Swami Abhedananda says t...

Chapter 5 - Education in India

Education in India can be divided into four periods: The first, the pre-Buddhistic, or before the sixth century b.c.; the second, the Buddhistic period, from 500 b.c. to the tenth century a.d.; the third, the Mohammedan; and the fourth, the period under British rule.

In order to get a correct idea of the education of a people, we must first be familiar with the civilization of that people, because the standard of education must go parallel with the culture and civilization of a nation. As we have already seen, the earliest civilization of the Hindus began in the vedic period. History tells us that during that time the Indo-Aryans developed their voluminous scriptural works known as the vedic literature, which consists of the Rig Veda, Yajur Veda, Sama Veda, and Atharva Veda, with their Bra.hma.nas, Aranyakas, and Upanishads. All these are in the Sanskrit language and are the most ancient Scriptures of the world. The Hindus of today consider these Vedas as revealed just as other nations believe in their scriptures as revealed. Long before the art of writing was known these Vedas were studied, committed to memory, and taught from mouth to mouth. In those early days the study of these sacred scriptures formed the principal feature in the education of the boys and girls of the Brahmins, Kshatriyas, and Vaishyas.

The life of a Hindu at that time was divided into four periods. The first was that of the student. The Aryan boys were initiated as students between the ages of eight and twelve. They then went to the teacher’s house, remained there and studied the Vedas. As in this age the students of civilized countries live in the universities for several years, so in ancient times the Hindu boys used to leave their homes and stay with their teachers. Some lived with them for twelve years, some for twenty-four, others for thirty-six or forty-eight years, in accordance with their desire to master one, two, three, or four Vedas. When they had finished these years of study under various instructors and professors, the students returned to their homes, after making a handsome gift to their masters. According to Hindu custom, no teacher should ever sell his knowledge or receive any salary in return for his instruction, but the students were allowed to make presents to their masters at the close of their studies. Having returned home, they married and settled themselves as householders. Some, however, did not return, but devoted their whole life to the study of various Shastras or sciences.

The main object of education at that time was the moral and spiritual culture of the soul, the attainment of God-consciousness and the knowledge of the various sacrifices that are described in the Vedas. Along with the Vedas the students had to learn the six Vedangas or limbs of the Vedas. These were regarded as the most important branches of Scriptural study. The first was Shiksha or the science of phonetics, that is, the science which explains the correct pronunciation of the Sanskrit words and texts used in the Vedas. The second was Chanda, or metre. The vedic hymns have different metres, and one must be familiar with them in order to read or chant correctly. The scholars and professors of Sanskrit in Europe and America find great difficulty in pronouncing Sanskrit words and sentences because their tongues are not flexible enough to express the minute shades of differences that exist in the sounds of Sanskrit words. The Hindus, however, used to study metre, as also the science of pronunciation and grammar. At that time (even as early as 1400 b.c.) they had a scientific grammar. The Greek and Sanskrit languages have the best grammars, but the Sanskrit is the most perfect grammar that exists in the world. Then Nirukta, the fourth branch, was the science which describes the etymology, the meanings of different words, as well as the use of the same word in various senses. Also there was Kalpa, which includes Shrautasutras, or the laws about sacrifices, Dharmasutras, or laws regarding the duties of a true citizen, Grihyasutras, the rules of domestic life, and Sulvasutras [Sulbasutras], the geometrical principles for constructing sacrificial altars. And the last branch was Jyotisha, or astronomy. In order to fix the time for vedic sacrifices they had to study astronomy. Without knowing astronomy they could not understand the Vedas and could not perform any of the sacrifices. For this reason we find many astronomical references in the Vedas.

These were the main branches of study to which every Hindu belonging to the upper three classes, Brahmins, Kshatriyas, and Vaishyas, was entitled. Besides this private education in the house of some teacher who, as I have already said, took no salary; there were public places for instruction. The courts of the enlightened kings and Maharajas were the principal seats of learning where education was bestowed free of charge; and there were also the Parishads, which corresponded to the universities of Europe. “At the period of transition from the vedic to the Brahmanic stage of religious development about 1200 b.c. the courts of the kings were the centres of culture.... At a later period, 1000 b.c., there arose Brahmanic settlements, called Parishads, which we might call collegiate institutions of learning”.[1] These public institutions were started and established by Brahmin professors and scholars. The students in them used to stay with the teachers and do some work in their households in return for free board and tuition. Professor Max Müller, in his “History of Sanskrit Literature”, says that a “Parishad used to consist of 21 Brahmins well-versed in philosophy, theology, and law. Sometimes three or four learned Brahmin scholars would form a small Parishad in a village”. In the Upanishad, we find mention of this kind of ancient Hindu university system. For instance, in the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad,.VI, 2, we read that Svetaketu went to the Parishads of the Panchalas for education.

In these colleges, were taught the Vedas, philosophy, theology, and Hindu law, civil and criminal—law of agriculture, of property, of usury, laws of inheritance and partition. These laws still govern Hindu society even under British rule. England has not succeeded in changing the Hindu laws and has not found any others more just or more perfect than those of the Hindus. This is not an exaggeration. Students of law, who have studied Roman and European law for years, cannot complete their Course without studying Hindu law.

I have already shown in the first lecture that there were six schools of philosophy among the Hindus of the pre-Buddhistic period, that is, between 1400 and 600 b.c. These six schools of philosophy included logic, psychology, the science of numbers and the evolution theory of Kapila, the atomic theory of Kanada, the science of thought, metaphysics, and the monistic science and philosophy of Vedanta. The students received instruction in these various branches in the Parishads or universities. Arithmetic, algebra, geometry, trigonometry, decimal notation, and astronomy were also taught during the pre-Buddhistic period. You may be surprised to know that in those ancient times such sciences and philosophies were known to the Hindus; but it is a matter of history that these various branches of science and philosophy owed their origin to the vedic religion of India. Geometry was developed from the rules for the construction of vedic altars as described in the Vedas. For instance, it is told there to describe a circle, make a triangle, or inscribe a triangle in a circle, and so on. When geometry fell into disuse in the Buddhistic period, after sacrifices were no longer made, algebra took its place. “The science of algebra indeed received a remarkable degree of development in India; the application of algebra to astronomical investigations and to geometrical demonstrations is a peculiar invention of the Hindus; and their manner of conducting it has received the admiration of modern European mathematicians”.[2]

Besides these, the great epics of Ramayana and Mahabharata, which contain the ancient national history of the Hindus as well as the essence of all Hindu sciences and philosophies, came into existence during the pre-Buddhistic period. They were studied by all classes of people, both men and women. They were written especially for those classes who were not fitted for vedic studies. The Vedas and the various sciences and philosophies existed among the Hindus long before the art of writing was known in the world. Can you believe that the hundreds of volumes which have been handed down to us were originally learned and taught from memory? They were transmitted from generation to generation by word of mouth. What a marvellous memory the people of that time had! The Mahabharata, for example, contains one hundred thousand verses in Sanskrit, and when I was in India, I knew a Brahmin lady who could recite every sentence from the beginning to the end; and there are many scholars who can recite a volume with its commentary without looking at the book. All sciences and philosophies were originally written in Sanskrit, but lately they have been translated into the various spoken dialects, of which there are at present about one hundred and fifty in India. Through these the masses obtain their moral and spiritual training. Public lectures and readings are given in almost every Hindu village for the education of the illiterate classes. Even today, in all Hindu communities, this old system of reading a Sanskrit verse and then explaining it in the vernacular language is very common. Those who cannot read or write receive moral and spiritual instruction through these Kathakata or public readings.

There were also medical schools for the study of Ayurveda, or the medical science. The word ‘ayus’ means life, and ‘veda’ means wisdom, knowledge, and hence science. Ayurveda, therefore, is the ‘science of life’. It contains the Hindu materia medica, which is much older than the sixth century b.c. It was taught long before the time of Hippocrates, the ‘father of medicine’, who lived about 400 b.c. Even in that early pre-Buddhistic age, Hindu medicine received scientific treatment, and there were separate schools and colleges for medical students. During the Buddhistic period, medical science made considerable progress, and exhaustive scientific works were written on medicine. Among these, the works by Charaka and Sushruta were the best. Their writings became so widely known that translations of them were already familiar to the Arabs in the eighth century a.d., at the time of Haroun-al-Raschid; and they still remain today the standard medical works among Hindu physicians. They contain exhaustive chapters on anatomy and physiology; on symptoms, diagnoses, and causes of various diseases, and on their proper treatment. Their words may be archaic, but they give a scientific treatment which was unknown in any other part of the world at that time.

Chemistry, in Sanskrit Rasayana, was also familiar to the Hindus from very early times. “Nor is this surprising, as the materials for preparing many chemical products have abounded in India. Rock-salt was found in Western India; borax was obtained from Tibet; saltpetre and sulphate of soda were easily made; alum was made in Cutch; and sal ammonia was familiar to the Hindus; with lime, charcoal and sulphur they were acquainted from time immemorial. The alkalies and acids were early known to the Hindus, and were borrowed from them by the Arabians. The medicinal use of metals was also largely known. We have notices of antimony and of arsenic, of medicines prepared with quick-silver, arsenic, and nine other metals. The Hindus were acquainted with the oxides of copper, iron, lead, tin, zinc, and lead; with the sulphurets of iron, copper, antimony, mercury, and arsenic; with the sulphates of copper, zinc, and iron; with the diacetate of copper and the carbonates of lead and iron”.[3] Dr. Royle also says, in his essay on Hindu Medicine: “Though the ancient Greeks and Romans used metallic substances as external applications, it is generally supposed that the Arabs were the first to prescribe them internally.... But in the works of Charaka and Sushruta, to which, as has been proved, the earliest of the Arabs had access, we find numerous metallic substances directed to be given internally”.[4] History tells us that Alexander the Great kept physicians in his camp for the treatment of diseases which Greek physicians could not heal; and in the eighth century a.d. the Mohammedan Badshaw, Haroun al-Raschid, retained in his court two Hindu physicians. As early as 260 b.c. the Buddhist emperor Asoka also established many public hospitals, not only for men, women, and children, but also for animals.

Megasthenes, after his long residence at the court of Chandra Gupta in the fourth century b.c., testified that he found among the Hindus various kinds of schools suited to the different castes. There were Brahmin schools, whose function was to train priests and teachers; warrior schools, where the pupils received military training; industrial schools for the merchant class; and schools for the lowest caste where manual labour was taught.

During the Buddhistic age, and before the Mohammedan invasion, Hindu culture in every branch of science and philosophy made tremendous progress. Arya Bhatta, the noted Hindu astronomer, who lived about 476 a.d. and who is called the Newton of India, wrote many works on algebra and astronomy. It was he who first discovered the rotation of the earth on its own axis. As a Jewish writer says: “The theory that the earth is a sphere revolving on its own axis, which immortalized Copernicus, was previously known only to the Hindus, who were instructed in the truth of it by Aryabhatta in the first century before the common era”.[5] He also discovered the true cause of solar and lunar eclipses, and it was he who, for the first time, grasped the idea of gravitation toward the centre (called in Sanskrit madhyakarshan, that is, attraction toward the centre, and correctly calculated the distance of the earth’s circumference. His successor, Varahamihira, another noted astronomer (500-587 a.d.), left valuable works, especially his Brihat-Samhita, which covered almost every department of natural history and was encyclopedic in its nature. Brahma Gupta, who lived in 628 a.d., described in his astronomical system the true places of the planets, the calculation of lunar and solar eclipses, and wrote a treatise on spherics. There are still some ruins of Hindu observatories in Banaras and other cities.

In the sixth century a.d., this golden age of science and letters reached its climax in the reign of the great Hindu emperor, Vikramaditya, who was what Augustus was to the Romans, what Alfred was.to the English, what Charlemagne was to the French, what Asoka was to the Buddhists, and what Haroun-al-Raschid was to the Mohammedans. He was the great supporter of learning and education among the Hindus. To the learned, to the illiterate, to poets, to story-tellers, to dramatists and novelists, to astronomers, lexicographers, and historians, to the old and to the young, the name of Vikramaditya is as familiar in India as the name of any great patron of science, drama, poetry, and education of modern Europe. He had nine gems in his court, and the finest among them was Kalidasa, the great Hindu dramatist. He was as great as Shakespeare of England; indeed, he is called the Shakespeare of India.

His best known drama, Shakuntala has been translated into more than one European language, and has been considered by such great scholars as Augustus William Von Schlegel, Alexander Von Humboldt, and Goethe as one of the dramatic masterpieces of the world. Goethe speaks thus of it:

“Wouldst thou the life’s young blossoms and the fruits of its decline, And all by which the soul is pleased, enraptured, feasted, fed—

Wouldst thou the earth and heaven itself in one sweet name combine? I name thee, O Sakuntala, and all at once is said.”

You have heard something about Shakuntala, Vikramorvasi, and the other dramas and masterpieces which Kalidasa left. His Meghaduta, or the ‘Cloud Messenger’, can stand side by side with the best poems of Shelley and Wordsworth, if not higher. One critic says: “Like Wordsworth, he looked upon Nature with the eye of a lover, and his knowledge of the physical laws is superior to that of any other Hindu poet.” Kalidasa’s successors,—Bharavi, Dandin, Banabhatta, Subandhu, Bhartrihari, Bhavabhuti,—all these great Hindu poets and dramatists lived in the sixth century a.d. Their writings are still studied in all Sanskrit colleges, as they were twelve centuries ago.

The fables of Panchatantra and of Hitopadesha[6], which gave foundation to Aesop’s fables and to the fables of Pilpay, are also still studied in the primary schools of India. They came into existence in the sixth century after Christ, and have been translated into all the civilized languages of the world. Panchatantra “was translated into Persian in the reign of Nausharwan (531-572 a.d.).... The Persian translation was rendered into Arabic, and the Arabic translation was rendered into Greek by Symeon Seth about 1080.... A Spanish translation of the Arabic was published about 1251. The first German translations were published in the fifteenth century”.[7] Besides these, the vast literature known as the Puranas is still studied by all classes of people, both men and women, as they were a thousand years ago.

From this you will get an idea of the civilization of the Hindus during the ancient pre-Buddhistic and mediaeval ages, and you will be able to form some conception of what kind of education they received before the advent of the British in India. The Hindus, it must be remembered, have gone through a great many national disasters, calamities, and vicissitudes; and during the Mohammedan occupation, which began in the eleventh century a.d. and continued for nearly six hundred years, they made very little progress in scientific education. They had to fight to protect themselves against the invaders, and turn their attention to their political condition; consequently they neglected the study of science. Furthermore, the Mohammedan sword and fire destroyed the glorious monuments of Hindu culture and civilization. The Mohammedan rulers never encouraged any kind of study outside of the reading of the Koran, for which classes were attached to the mosques. It is said that the Moghul Emperor Aurangzeb, in the seventeenth century, established universities in all the principal cities and erected schools in the’ smaller towns, but it is now difficult to get any historical evidence to support this statement. A Mohammedan believes that the essence of all literature and of all science is summed up in the Koran, so nothing outside of the Koran is to be studied. If all that is worth knowing is in the Koran, then there is no use of studying any other books. So they destroyed all the scriptures, and all the works on science and philosophy, which they could get hold of. But the caste prejudice of the Hindus kept the Brahmins from mixing with the Mohammedans, and one of the most beneficial effects of the caste system was the preservation of the sacred books of the Hindus from the destructive hands of fanatical Mussulmans.

Mohammedan elementary schools were started for the study of the Persian and Arabic languages. Many Hindu boys used to study these languages in Mohammedan schools. They had no feeling of prejudice, so far as education was concerned. In the advanced Mohammedan schools, there were complete courses in rhetoric, logic, law, ritual, and theology; all these and the Arabic language were taught to Mussulman students, but not to the Hindus. Euclid and Ptolemy’s astronomy, and other branches of natural philosophy, were also taught in the high schools for Mohammedans at the time when British rule began in India, about the middle of the eighteenth century.

The pioneers of Western education in India were the Christian missionaries. Some Danish missionaries arrived at Tranquebar, in Southern India, in 1706, and at once began to study the vernacular languages in order to teach the Bible. They founded some schools for that purpose, which were of minor importance. Their object was to convert the students to Christianity. In 1727, the first English mission established in India a society for promoting Christian knowledge, but it did not make much progress until the beginning of the nineteenth century, when the third missionary society of the English Baptists was established in Bengal. Their representatives were Carey and Marshman, who were men of ability and distinction. They studied the vernacular languages, and established schools for the teaching of the Bible.

The East India Company, however, hesitated to impart English education to the natives of India. When, in 1792, Welberforce proposed to add two clauses to the Charter Act of the year for sending out schoolmasters to India, the directors of the Company strongly objected to the proposal. “On that occasion one of the Directors stated that we had just lost America from our folly in having allowed the establishment of schools and colleges, and that it would not do for us to repeat the same act of folly in regard to India; if the natives required anything in the way of education they must come to England for it.”.[8] The policy still exists at the bottom of the educational system established by the British Government in modern India. Although this policy, or rather fear, has apparently been modified, and schools, colleges, and universities have been founded, still the government of India does not feel safe in giving the natives substantial higher education of the same nature as can be obtained in England, Europe, or America. It was on account of this fear that the only educational institutions which were established upto 1792 were a Mohammedan College at Calcutta, founded by Warren Hastings in 1781, and a Sanskrit College at Banaras, founded by Lord Cornwallis in 1992. The main object of these institutions was to train law officers, both Mohammedan and Hindu, to help the English judges in the judicial administration of the country. For twenty years longer the English Government was disinclined to spread English education in India.

In 1813 the British Parliament, for the first time, offered the sum of £10,000 from the revenue of India, to be appropriated for the education of the people of the three provinces of Bengal, Bombay, and Madras. Nothing, however, was done for ten years until 1823.[9] In the meantime the Hindus themselves, under the leadership of the great Hindu reformer, whose name is known all over the world, Rajah Ram Mohun Roy, became anxious to learn the English language. He was the first Hindu who learned English thoroughly by his private exertions, for there was no school at that time; and he was the first native of India who went to England, where he died. His grave still exists in Bristol. At that time there was in Calcutta an illiterate English watchmaker, Mr. David Hare by name. He was a man of great energy and practical sense. Rajah Ram Mohun Roy consulted with him and planned to open an English seminary. The project started in 1815, and this energetic Mr. Hare had some circulars written out and distributed. He first succeeded in interesting some of the English officers and some representative Hindus, and in 1817 he established a school in Calcutta which is known to-day as the Hare School. It was the first respectable English seminary in Bengal, and was founded by the Hindus themselves before the British Government did anything for education in India.[10]

In 1820 the Government of India started an inquiry to find out the indigenous method of education among the Hindus in the Presidencies of Madras, Bombay, and Bengal; but for two years nothing was done. In 1822 Sir Thomas Munroe, the Governor of Madras, finding the decay of literature and arts and the deep ignorance of the masses, started an investigation, from which he discovered that the number of Hindu schools and colleges under the old Hindu system, in the Presidency of Madras alone, amounted to 12,498 among a population of something over twelve millions. In his report to the Court of Directors, which was made known in 1826, he says: “I am inclined to estimate the portion of the whole population who receive school education to be nearer one-third than one-fourth of the whole. The state of education exhibited, low as it is, compared with our own country, is higher than it was in most European countries at no very distant time”.[11]

In 1823 Lord Elphinstone, Governor of Bombay, found that there was in the Bombay Presidency alone 1705 Hindu schools and colleges; and in 1835 Lord Bentinck discovered 3355 Hindu schools among a population of seven millions in Bengal alone. This will prove how the Hindus have always cared for knowledge, culture, and education. In every village there was an elementary school where the village boys were taught reading, writing, arithmetic, and the elements of mensuration. These elementary schools were called Pathasalas, or school-houses. Besides these, there were collegiate institutions like the Parishads, which I have already described, for higher education in grammar, mathematics, rhetoric, poetry, astronomy, and other branches of science and philosophy, as they were known to the Hindus at that time. The proportion of the latter to the former, that is, of collegiate schools to village schools, was one to three.

A Committee of Public Instruction was appointed by the East India Company’s government in 1823, and the £10,000, which had been granted by Parliament ten years before, were expended in establishing an English school, under the name of Hindu College, in Calcutta, six Oriental colleges, and a number of elementary schools in Bengal and Rajputana. The Committee also gave its attention to the publication of Oriental books, and started a press in 1824.

Between 1823 and 1833 no special thing was done in the educational line other than to add classes in English in all the chief colleges. In 1835 Lord Bentinck, the Governor-General of India, enlarged the Committee of Public Instruction and appointed Macaulay as its president. Two distinguished Hindu gentlemen of the time, Sir Rajah Radha Kanta Deb Bahadur and Rossomoy Dutt of Calcutta, and Takawar Jung, the Mohammedan Nawab of Bengal, were enrolled as members of the Committee. With Macaulay’s support and assistance, Lord Bentinck passed the famous resolutions of March 7, 1835, by which the English language was established as the language of superior education in India.

The resolutions were these:

(1) That the chief aim of the educational policy of the Government should be to promote a knowledge of European literature and science.

(2) That henceforth no more stipends should we conferred, but that all existing stipends should be continued as long as the natives continue to avail themselves of them.

(3) That the printing of Oriental books should at once cease, and that the funds thus set free should be employed in promoting European studies through the medium of the English language.

In Madras, about this time, a Hindu, named Pachiapa, left a large donation for religious uses, and out of this sum, which amounted to nearly £80,000, a central educational institution, which is now known as Pachiapa’s College, was established by the Hindus in 1839. It still continues to be the most flourishing college for the study of English in Madras, and it was the first college established there. In 1830 Alexander Duff arrived in Calcutta as the missionary of the General Assembly of the Scotch Kirk, and established a school which was at first a great success; but his aim was to convert the natives to Christianity, and when some of the students were persuaded to accept Christianity, the whole Hindu community protested against the object and plan of the missionary schols and would not allow their children to enter them as students. During his stay, Alexander Duff succeeded in converting only forty young Hindus who were studying in his school, and the conversion of these created a great sensation in the city of Calcutta. About that time the Hindus began to study Thomas Paine’s Age of Reason. The book spread like wildfire among native students and scholars, and Dr. Duff, finding that it was a great obstacle in the path of converting the Hindus, bought all the copies that were in the market, piled them in the street and made a bonfire out of them; but the Hindus reprinted the book and distributed it among themselves.

Being thus aroused, the native Hindus of Calcutta were determined to start schools and colleges for the education of their boys in English. Foremost among them was Pundit Isvara Chunder Vidyasagar, the most distinguished educationist and the greatest Hindu scholar of his time. He established by his own individual efforts, unaided by the Government, the Metropolitan Institution in Calcutta, and today it is one of the most powerful and best conducted colleges in India. It has always been entirely under Hindu management, and all its teachers and professors are Hindus. Hundreds and thousands of students study English and are graduated every year under native professors.

Lord Hardinge established one hundred schools in the different districts of Bengal for the purpose of imparting education in the vernacular as a preliminary step to higher education in English. He also passed the famous resolution of 1844 for the selection of candidates for public employment from those who had been educated in the institutions established. This gave a tremendous impetus to native efforts to start schools, colleges, and seminaries in Calcutta and other places. Intense desire to learn and teach English was expressed by all classes of people and no caste distinction was observed. Students from all castes and all classes wanted to study and to teach English, and schools sprang up on all sides for imparting English education.

In 1836 Hoogly College was opened, and in three days twelve hundred names were enrolled and an auxiliary school was immediately filled. In 1843 there were fiftyone schools and colleges, containing 8,200 students, of whom 5,132 were studying English, 426 Sanskrit, 572 Arabic, and 706 the Persian language. In 1839 Lord Auckland offered a grant from the Government treasury of 25,000 rupees (about $8000) to promote Oriental education; and in 1845 Mr. Thomson, the Governor of the North Western Provinces, started a plan to encourage the native village schools of the Hindus, which have existed in India for ages. This plan involved the establishment of: (1) An elementary school for circles of villages, each school to be situated in a central village and no village to be more than one mile from the central school; (2) A middle school at the headquarters of each subdivision; (3) A high school in each Zillah or district. This plan was sanctioned by the Directors, who made an allowance of 500,000 rupees. Operations began in 1850, and after four years there were eight District High Schools in the whole North Western Province. For the support of these state schools (which were not free) monthly fees, which varied from one to twelve rupees, were exacted of all students. In the state schools the fees were higher than in the private schools.

The missionary schools were mostly elementary or primary. Only three or four of them imparted secondary education, and some of them were free of charge to help the poorer classes. Up to this time the Government had not taken any step to educate the girls. Female education received no support from the Government; while the missionaries were trying their best to educate native girls in the tenets of Christianity, denouncing the religion of their forefathers and condemning everything of Hindu origin or which had to do with Hindu society and religion, in the same manner as they did in the schools for boys. This is one of the greatest drawbacks in the missionary methods of education. They condemn everything that is outside of their religion, their standards and their ideals. They are too narrow to see good in any but their own creed and dogmas. They do not consider the Hindu religion as a religion or the Hindu Saviours as Saviours; but they think that the Hindus are all going to eternal perdition and so they are very anxious to save their heathen souls! An American missionary, in referring to the schools for non-Christians in India, writes: “These are especially established with a view to reaching and affecting the non-Christian community.... They represent the leaven of Christianity in India. They furnish excellent opportunity to present Christ and his Gospel of salvation to a large host of young people under very favourable circumstances.... And I fearlessly maintain that more conversions take place and more accessions arc made through these schools than through any other agency.” This will give you an idea of the fanaticism and bigotry of these apostles of Christianity, who pretend to impart free education to the boys and girls of poor, illiterate parents. The poor Hindu boys and girls come to study and learn something, but instead of receiving the blessing of true education, their minds are filled with superstitious and unscientific doctrines and dogmas, and they are forced to leave the community of their parents and relatives and become converts to Christianity. These missionaries do not think for a moment why the Hindus should give up their own prophets and Saviours and worship the prophets of the Semitic race, especially of the Jews. Why should the Hindus abandon their ancient traditions and the religion of their Aryan forefathers? Why should they forsake the Aryan prophets and accept the Jewish prophets instead? Those who never had any higher philosophy, higher religion, or a spiritual leader like Christ, may accept with delight the banner of Christ, but not the Hindus, who have many Saviours,—Krishna, Rama, Buddha, Chaitanya, Ramakrishna,—each of whom, according to the Hindus, was as great as the Saviour of Nazareth. The Christian missionaries, before preaching Christ among the Hindus, should first convert the Jews.

The East India Company’s Charter was renewed in 1853, and a Lords’ Committee was appointed to make necessary additions or modifications in the policy of the government of India. Among other things, the Committee discussed the subject of education of the people of India. After collecting evidence from all sides, the Committee issued a Despatch in 1854, constituting the great Charter of Indian education; and on this Despatch the whole system of education in India of to-day is based. It approved of the higher education and the establishment of universities in Calcutta, Bombay, and Madras, the chief towns of the three Presidencies under British rule. The Despatch of 1854 extended the field of education and prescribed these objects: “First, the constitution of a separate department of the administration of education. Second, the institution of the universities at the Presidency towns. Third, the establishment of institutions for training teachers for all classes of schools. Fourth, the maintenance of the existing Government colleges and high schools, and the increase of their number when necessary. Fifth, the establishment of new middle schools. Sixth, increased attention to vernacular schools, indigenous or other, for elementary education. And seventh, the introduction of a system of grants-in-aid.

“Aid is to be given (so far as available funds may render it possible) to all schools imparting a good secular education, provided they are under adequate local management and subject to Government inspection, and provided that fees, however small, are charged in them.” In the assignment of these grants, however, there were no less than five systems in operation. They were as follow:

(1) The Salary Grant System, in use in Madras only, was applied to secondary education. Under this system the Government contributed a fixed proportion of the teacher’s salary in accordance with his qualifications.

(2 The Results Grant System was in Madras applied to primary education only, and in Bombay to secondary education. To obtain this grant it was necessary to pass Government examinations.

(3) The combined Salary Results System.

(4) The Fixed Period System was in operation in the greater part of Northern and Central India. Under this an average grant was paid for period of three or five years.

(5) The Captitative System was applied to a few girls’ schools in Bengal.

The seven articles of the Despatch of 1854 helped in a systematic manner the promotion of education in India. The English language became the medium in the higher branches and the vernacular in the lower. The system of grants-in-aid was based upon the principle of absolute neutrality. Aid was given from 1854 to all schools imparting a good secular education. Three universities were established in 1857 by Lord Canning after the model of the London University. Thus the inspiring influence of Western education reached a larger circle of the population. Two more universities have been added since,—one in the Punjab in 1882 and the other in Allahabad in 1887; so there are altogether five universities in India,—one is Calcutta, one in Bombay, one in Madras, one in the Punjab and the other in Allahabad. These universities consist of a chancellor, the governor of the Presidency ex officio, a vice-chancellor, and not less than thirty fellows, who constitute a Senate. The Senate controls the management of the funds of the universities, and frames rules and regulations, which are subject to Government approval and under which examinations are held periodically in the various branches of art and science by examiners chosen from among themselves or nominated from outside. The Senate is divided into four faculties,—Arts, Law, Medicine, and Engineering. The executive government of the university is in the hands of a syndicate, which consists of the vice-chancellor and eight of the Fellows. This syndicate selects examiners, regulates examinations, recommends for degrees, honours, and rewards, and carries on the business of the university. Boards of studies in the various departments are also appointed from among the Fellows by the syndicate. The Fellows do not correspond to the Fellows of this country, nor of Europe, nor even of England. The office of Fellow is an honorary office, usually conferred on some representative man or upon those who have been active in the cause of education. The may be natives or Europeans. The Indian universities are without a staff of teachers. They simply hold examinations and grant degrees, but they have no courses of lectures. In India we do not have anything like the universities of this country and nothing like Cambridge and Oxford. I will give you an idea of the examinations that are held under the universities:

The subjects of examinations are: (1) English; (2) A classical (Oriental or European) or vernacular language; (3) Physics and Chemistry; (4) History; (5) Geography; (6) Arithmetic, Algebra, Geometry. This is the examination for entrance into college. Under each university there are many schools and colleges started and managed by the natives. Then after two years’ study in a college the student prepares for the First Examination in Arts. The subjects are (1) English; (2) A classical language (Oriental or European) or a vernacular; (3) Logic; (4) Mathematics; (5) History and Geography; and (6) Physical Science. Two years later comes the B.A. Examination. This has two branches—the Language Division and the Science Division. The subjects in the Language Division are: (1) English; (2) A classical or vernacular language; (3) Mathematics; (4) and (5) any two of the following: Moral Philosopy, History, and Advanced Mathematics. The Science Division consists of (1) English; (2) Mathematics; (3) Chemistry; (4) Physical Geography; (5) Physics, Physiology, or Geology.

For the degree of Masters of Arts there is an honour examination in Language, Mental and Moral Philosophy, Natural Science, or History and Mathematics. Then there are Law examinations, Medical examinations, and Civil Engineering examinations with degrees.

This system has been in existence for the last forty-eight years. The total number of students in schools and colleges all over British India is 4,405,042. Today, excluding cities, three villages out of four are without schools, and seven children out of eight are growing up in ignorance and darkness.

According to the census of 1901 there are 147,086 educational institutions of all kinds in British India. Of these 104,748 are public institutions (that is, institutions open to all classes but not free), which are divided as follows: 44 Professional Colleges, 141 Art Colleges, 5461 Secondary Schools, 98,183 Primary Schools, 170 Training Schools, and 494 Special Schools. In addition to these there are 42,343 private institutions, of which 4306 are advanced, 26,668 elementary, 11,016 teaching the Koran only, and 263 not conforming to departmental standards. “During the past three years the sum of 4,000,000 rupees has been contributed by the (native) public in the United Provinces towards education. Nearly half of this sum was given in the year 1905. The numbers attending public institutions of all kinds have increased, while those attending private institutions have declined. The past year witnessed the erection of several schools and boarding-houses, the institution of schemes for the development of Sanskrit, Arabic, the enlargement of the Medical School at Agra, the development of mechanical training and electrical work at Rurki and the starting of an institution for mechanical and manual training at Lucknow”.[12]

The Government does not give free education in India and although the Hindus pay all kinds of taxes—40 per cent more than the tax-payer of Great Britain and Ireland—and support the most expensive system of administration, still they do not receive from the Government free education. The Government now spends annually nearly 27 million pound sterling for military expenses and about £750,000 for the education of the natives. The Rev. J. T. Sunderland, after long residence in India, says: “Much credit has been given to the Indian Government for education. It has done some good work in this direction, for which let it have full praise. But how little has it done compared with the need, or compared with what the people want, or compared with its ability, if it would only use its resources primarily for India’s good! Why has so little of the people’s money been spent for education? In the schools of India, of all kinds, high and low, there are some 4,418,000 scholars (if we include the native states). But what is this number in a population nearly as large as that of all Europe? How much does the Indian Government spend annually for education? The munificent sum of one penny and a fifth per head of the population I Think of it I Is it any wonder that, after a century and a half of British dominance, the number of persons in India who can read and write is only about eleven in a hundred among males, and one in two hundred among females? With their native industries so badly broken down, the Indian people have special need for industrial, technical, and practical education. But their rulers are giving them almost nothing of this kind. Britain’s neglect of education is a dark stain upon her treatment of India”.[13]

The Government has no school or college for female education. The first girls’ school was established in Calcutta by Mr. Drinkwater Bethune (a legal member of the Governor-General’s Council), who gave £10,000 from his own pocket. This school is the most successful institution for girls in India, and teaches up to the highest grades of university examinations. The Indian universities bestow degrees on women, and lady graduates take their degrees in Calcutta, Madras, and Bombay. There are many girls’ schools which have been started by the Hindus. In private primary schools, little boys and girls are taught together. The total number of girls who receive education is about half a million; but the majority of Hindu girls receive their education at home. The illiterate women in India are given moral and spiritual instruction, as well as instruction in religious truths and moral duties, and in their national traditions and literature, to a much larger extent than in Europe.

About 85 per cent of the population of India today depends upon agriculture. Yet the Government had no agricultural institution in the country until recently, when it started an agricultural college in Poona, near Bombay.

Education in India is very expensive, considering that the average annual income per head is £2, out of which 14 to 15 per cent goes towards paying taxes. Furthermore, the educated Hindus, who have spent a considerable part of this income in receiving university degrees, have no prospect of obtaining higher position in Government offices. All the higher positions are occupied by English officials, who draw large salaries, while native graduates are allowed to remain as clerks on a salary of three to ten dollars per month. Until recently, these Hindu graduates had the one chance of entering Government offices through competitive examinations. But Lord Curzon closed that door by passing the University Bill, which brings the universities and schools under rigid official control. Now none but those who are appointed by the Government can hold any Government position. The Official Secrets Bill passed by Lord Curzon has also gagged the Indian press. There are a number of daily and weekly papers published in English by the Hindus. But they cannot agitate against the political and economic policy of the Government. Thus people are kept in absolute darkness. Notwithstanding his despotic rule, however, Lord Curzon did one good act in allowing a permanent grant of £220,000 from the surplus revenue for primary education.

India needs today free education, and free industrial and technical schools and colleges for the masses. India needs schools and colleges for the education of girls, not under the management of Christian missionaries, but under the management of the Hindus. India needs a national university where boys and girls will receive secular education free of charge, and where all technical and manual training can be obtained freely.

Today the Hindus have shown to the world that intellectually they are equal to the most intellectual people of Europe and America, but they are down-trodden and poor. The whole weight of the British Government is grinding the nation and crushing the spirit of progress. Furthermore, India is impoverished under British rule; yet the Hindus are raising private funds and sending their students to America and Japan to receive a better and more substantial education than what they receive under the British Government. The Hindus are eager to learn, and they are indebted to England for introducing Western education in India. If England has done any good to India, it is by the introduction of English education. This is the greatest blessing that India has received under British rule. The seed of Western education is sown in the soil of India; future generations will reap the fruit.

Herbert Spencer says: “education is training for completeness of life”. The Hindus now see the defects of the present system of education in India, and are endeavouring to reform it and to make it as perfect as it can be in this land of free education and political independence. May their noble efforts be crowned with glorious success.

Footnotes and references:

[1]:

Cf. W. I. Chamberlain, Ph.D.: Education in India, p. 20.

[2]:

Cf. Civilization in Ancient India, Vol. II, p. 246.

[3]:

Civilization in Ancient India, Vol. II, p. 254.

[4]:

Royle, p. 45.

[5]:

Jewish Encyclopedia, Vol. XII, p. 689.

[6]:

The fables of Hitopadesha have been translated by Sir Edwin Arnold under the name of The Book of Good Counsels.

[7]:

Civilization in Ancient India, Vol: II, p. 297.

[8]:

Cf. C. Marshman’s Evidence, Lords’ Second Report, 1853.

[9]:

Vide Sir Charles Travelyan’s Evidence, Lords’ Second Report, 1853.

[10]:

Vide Rev. Alexander Duff’s Evidence, Lords’ Second Report, 1853.

[11]:

Cf. Minute dated March 10, 1826.

[12]:

Cf. The Indian Nation, Jan. 22, 1906.

[13]:

Paper on The Causes of Famines in India, before the Canadian Institute, p. 22.

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