“Our English schools are flourishing wonderfully…”
A thought-provoking excerpt for the week (emphasia added):
Our English schools are flourishing wonderfully. We find it difficult, indeed, in some places impossible, to provide instruction for all who want it. At the single town of Hoogly fourteen hundred boys are learning English.
The effect of this education on the Hindoos is prodigious.
No Hindoo, who has received an English education, ever remains sincerely attached to his religion. Some continue to profess it as matter of policy;but many profess themselves pure Deists, and some embrace Christianity.
It is my firm belief that, if our plans of education are followed up, there will not be a single idolater among the respectable classes in Bengal thirty years hence.
And this will be effected without any efforts to proselytise; without the smallest interference with religious liberty; merely by the natural operation of knowledge and reflection. I heartily rejoice in the prospect.
Image Courtesy: Wikimedia.org
From a letter written by T B Macaulay to his father in October 1836. Source:Â The Life and Letters of Lord Macaulay
Somewhat Related Posts: Clearing the dust off Macaulay’s “famous quoteâ€
The idea of India and Economic Exploitation and the Drain of Wealth during British “Rajâ€
What has happened is quite the opposite. English has provided the Hindu with a means to globalize Hinduism. After relocating to India four months back, I am delighted to see the myriad forms in which the religion is embraced by all segments of society. Rama is now not only a litigant in a land dispute, (a case which He won), but also the current superhero in an animated film on his life. Just moved back from California, a state where you can’t throw a stone without hitting a yoga teacher. Instead of worrying about if we are losing something in learning English, let us recognize that English provides us with the means (perhaps even the weapon) in which to market our concept of religion to a global audience.
Poor Macaulay would have been dismayed by how wrong he was!
English has not only not robbed us of our culture, it’s given India the tools to spread it around the world and carve a place for ourselves globally.
Just goes to show that trying to craft a society artificially is fraught with danger. You can never predict how it’s going to turn out.
If Macaulay could have peered into the present right now, he would have ordered all schools to stop teaching English pronto!
Quoting Gandhiji: “The school must be an extension of home. There must be concordance between the impressions which a child gathers at home and at school, if the best results are to be obtained. Education through the medium of strange tongue breaks the concordance which should exist.
It is my considered opinion that English education in the manner it has been given has emasculated the English educated Indian. It has produced a gulf between the educated classes and the masses. No country can become a nation by producing a race of imitators.
Thanks for the comments…I doubt any of you have forgotten the discussion on Indian languages and English etc here: https://satyameva-jayate.org/2010/08/04/mother-india-modern-india/
I see quite the opposite from the above commentators. It is quite true that an English educated Indian is ashamed of calling himself ‘Hindu’- he has found a harmless word – ‘The Secular Indian’.
This is what Shantanu’s post above is trying to depict- and all of you are seeing exactly the opposite!
It is quite shameful that people like Frawley, Francois Gautier and Koenrad Elst are required to show us the greatness of our heritage. We are mostly apologetic- and that’s a fact!
This is Macaulay effect for you..
Hindu Religion is the only hope for a peaceful world, if such a world ever comes. Rest only play the game of one upmanship. Universal Brotherhood – no way! Come to my religion – this is the best – the ego – the root of all battles!
Shantanu,
You will find more relevant material in following two books
1. Missionaries in India by Arun Shourie
2. A beautiful Tree by James Tooley
Zahar bhi chaaha agar
Peena to peene na diya…..
Akshar, rather than James Tooley, it is Dharam Pal who should get the credit. But unfortunately, it’s when a westerner/gora writes something about an issue, it becomes credible and acceptable to Indians, even if other Indians have already written the same things about that topic before. This is a pernicious after-effect of colonialism which we need to be cognizant of.
@GyanP
Don’t you find it a bit odd when you say
“Rest only play the game of one upmanship”
and then you go right ahead with the statement:
“Hindu Religion is the only hope for a peaceful world”
I mean, aren’t you playing the game of one upmanship yourself with these two statements?
It’s like saying “Hinduism is the most peaceful and tolerant religion. All other religions must be wiped out!!”
Harapriya, you wrote:
“English has provided the Hindu with a means to globalize Hinduism. After relocating to India four months back, I am delighted to see the myriad forms in which the religion is embraced by all segments of society. Rama is now not only a litigant in a land dispute, (a case which He won), but also the current superhero in an animated film on his life.”
I’m not sure what English has to do with the facts of “myriad forms in which the religion is embraced by all segments” or “Rama is not only a litigant…but also the current superhero.”
You wrote:
“Just moved back from California, a state where you can’t throw a stone without hitting a yoga teacher.”
Again, I’m not sure what’s the role of English in having numerous yoga teachers in California – could you please explain? How many of those yoga teachers are Indians/Hindus?
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/josh-schrei/the-god-project-hinduism_b_486099.html
Josh Scheri, The God Project: Hinduism as Open-Source Faith
I think English education of indians paved the way for more liberal approaches like Brahma-ism which was very popular among accomplished dignitaries of Bengal which was the first beneficiary of Macaulay’s education policy, with Calcutta University and Presidency College being the centres of liberal education.
Ironically it was Bengal itself which redicovered the value of Hinduism through an enlightened approach and this was pioneered by none other than an illiterate Brahmin Ramakrishna and his followers most of them being accomplished erudites and even belonging to Brahma movement, most notable being Swami Vivekananda.
It will not probably be wrong to stress that Vivekananda was one of the foremost in reinstilling a sense of pride among educated Indians on their religion, which did a lot to propel the Nationalist movements. Of course other stalwarts like Balgangadhar Tilak in Maharastra, Swami Dayanand Saraswati in North India, held a lot of sway and influence, but Swami Vivevakanda effectively catapaulted India and its religion on a global platform. He was well supported in his efforts by eminent Europeans of that time who had discovered the hidden jewels of Vedas and Upanishads, most notable among them being MaxMueller.
That Europe, the symbol of cultural and political ascendancy respected Hinduism was more than enough for reversing the tide of English educated liberal Indians moving away from Hinduism So in a way, English education has done a lot of good. Without it we would not have Brahma Samaj spreading the principles of Vedas, we would not have men like Vivekananda and Aurobindo upholding the ancient glory, ad we would not have the self confidence and universal acceptability of educated Indians who spoke for their motherland and religion.
Thomas B Macaulay was a religious bigot.
Read http://www.columbia.edu/itc/mealac/pritchett/00generallinks/macaulay/index.html#index
T.B.Macaulay’s Uncle Gen. Colin Macaulay became resident of state of Travancore. (correlate this with the conversions in that region).
TBM, at age of seven is supposed to have composed an ‘argument’ to persuade the people of travancore to embrace Xism.
Shantanuji
English education has become a curse for Indians. This statement may sound bit exaggerated or ridiculous to many. But let me make it clear – when we compare the effect of any policy – we must look the impact that it had on majority – and should not confine ourselves to few luminaries like Swami Vivekananda or Brahmo Samaj. We only look at person who could prove himself in English but forget about those millions of Indians who were as much talented but did not care (or were not capable to have mastery in alien language).
If we had adopted & promoted Hindi as much as we have done for English we could have produced thousands of Balgangadhar Tilak, hundreds of Aurobindo & scores of Vivekananda. Think about the situation when we have these luminaries in such quantities. India would have been superpower by 1975 (within 25 yrs of Independence)
What if we had not been saddled with English language – language that is not only alien but the culture that it promoted was diametrically opposite to us.
Indians self confidence would have been more if we had promoted Sanskrit as its national language – language for research & development. Sanskrit is still one of the most scientific languages in world – due to its structure of language and its phonology and its etymology. We could have compared & evaluated the effect only one when we had given equal opportunity to Sanskrit (by designing at least two education system).
Now as an English teacher, let me share my experience of teaching English to hundreds of student (from class 5th to post graduate level). Language is not only one skill but inherent birth right of every human being. This inherent right enables us to express without which we can not have any relationship and hence social structure. In our modern world (materialistic & too commercial to analyze anything from different perspective), we look language only as one tool to get job and achieve success.
This view has made life of thousands people but at the cost of millions of other who can not reach up to that standards. If you observe children struggling with an alien language day in and day out and working too hard to express in English – you will feel their pain or unimaginable burden, only then you can grasp the gravity of the situation.
Language is the first tool any children have to learn to enable to learn any other subject in life. If we snatch his mother tongue from him, he is quite incapable to grasp subject deeply. There are hardly any scientific surveys conducted in India to measure the impact of English language on children. There are hardly any researches conducted to prove the efficiency of English medium school. Whether these schools enable students to have effective mastery on the language or these are the institutions that waste natural talent of millions of students.
Indore
There seems to be a common lament among the English educated that somehow by embracing English, we have lost something that is of great value. No doubt by educating the masses in English, we end up reading our own literary works in translation as opposed in original Sanskrit, Tamil etc. But on the flip side, English serves to make the society more egalitarian. It is quite revealing that the Tamil Nadu government seeks to impart instruction in many of its government schools after pursuing a policy of nothing but Tamil for the last 60 years.
Even those authors who represent the sane voice of Hindu nationalism write in English (e.g Arun Shourie, Sita Ram Goel).
@Kaffir: The point about yoga and california etc. The idea is that the original teachers of yoga (Maharishi Mahesh yogi, BKS Iyengar, Krishnamachari) all spoke and taught in English. That is why they were able to globalize their lessons.
As far as Shri Ram is concerned–my point was that English allows us to showcase the story to a larger audience. By the way, even the judgement was given in English–all 8000 odd pages of it.
English has become an integral part of our lives. I know that there are many Hindi lovers out there who would be offended by the idea that English might one day replace Hindi as the common language. But for the disgruntled Tamil, it’s all the the same–both are foreign languages, and I for one, would prefer one with a larger vocabulary.
correction: The tamil nadu govt seeks to impart instruction in English medium in its govt schools.
I fully agree with Harapriya. Just to put things in perspective, here is a counter-example. I was talking to a friend from Tanzania the other day. He told me that by forcing Swahili and abandoning English, the then ruler (Nyerere I believe) had done a great disservice to the country.
English has led the foundation for a resurgent India. I shudder to imagine the consequences if some other single language were to be imposed on the entire Indian population.
That said, India also had an opportunity to instil a sense of nationalism by vigorously following the three-language formula adopted in 1956 or so. It was wasted because no leader took it seriously. Even now, there is a case for revisiting the formula and acting on it.
Overuse of English has also led to some undesirable consequences. Some ideas that are predominantly Eastern or Indian have been thrown into an orphanage, so to say. Even worse, some have been replaced by western ideas that are more or less irrelevant for Indian society. Secularism replacing Sarvadharmasamabhava for example. There is an urgent need to invent new words and ideas that will enrich English and transform the debate.
@BJP
Who said “All other religions must be wiped outâ€?
Hindu Religion does not advocate conversions. Read it as “the spirit of Hinduism”.
–I thought it was obvious.
Anyway, that is besides the point in the current context. The views above expressed by various people echo the various hues of the problem. Some positive, many negative. One need not abandon English altogether.
The way the affairs are carried out presently, English has give rise to a new class of “Have’s” and “Have-not’s”, and a low self-esteem to Indian-ness.
Over all I will say Macaulay has been quite successful, even more than he himself imagined!
Russia, Germany and China all made progress on the strength of their own languages. They also learn English, but only where it is required.
As Ram Sharma above implies, English can at best be a Tool- not a living, breathing language.
Thanks all for some great comments and discussion…Hope to respond tomorrow.
I don’t think that we should abandon English – I’m not even sure that such an approach is even practical. But as Prakash and others have mentioned there are certain drawbacks of using English, and we need to be aware of these drawbacks and work to overcome them.
In addition to what Prakash mentioned re: secularism, another example I can give is that knowing English (and not Samskrit or an Indic language) makes one look at Hinduism through the English lens and the Western concepts of “religion” (based mostly on Christianity/Abrahamic religions), and that kind of mapping is very inaccurate and can lead to incorrect conclusions or half-baked understanding of the philosophical concepts in SanAtan Dharm. It leads to the sad outcomes of some Hindus reading Dawkins, Hitchens et al and their criticisms of the religion they are most familiar with (Christianity, other Abrahamic religions), and then simply copying-and-pasting that criticism on to Hindusim whether it is valid or not, and ignoring that not all religions are the same. Furthermore, while there may be some similarities, Indic religions are also significantly different from Abrahamic religions in their concepts and world-view.
Teaching of Sanskrit should have been made mandatory along with English and local languages. Strange but its true that even during British rule Sanskrit was a mandatory course (at least in Bengal) and after independence Sanskrit was deliberately pushed to the back. I also fully agree that the Hindi and the local language should be taught with more zeal. Infact if education is imparted using local language as is done in Germany or Japan, probably the quality of education would improve because young children are able to grasp local language more easily than a foreign language. However, it has to be ably supported by a sound teaching of English as a language from the primary level in order to ensure that we remain globally competitive, but a sense of pride must be instilled for the mother tongue, national language and Sanskrit whose literature has got so many gems to offer.
Incidentally I know of a Muslim scholar, Dr. Syed Mustafa Ali (who was driven out of Islamist Bangladesh because of his secular views and who was brought up in Shantiniketan under Rabindranath tagore’s tutelage) lamenting the demise of the old tradition of Sanskrit teachers imparting education with the help of “Chatuspathis”, who became obsolete under the British rule when more and more parents began sending their kids to the English schools.
In near future Sanskrit will be studied by Germans and Americans because they can understand the merit of the language, but not by the secular Indians.
BR Ambedkar a visionary for Sanskrit.
http://tilak.sulekha.com/blog/post/2007/08/bheemayanam-a-biography-of-dr-ambedkar-in-sanskrit.htm
A dispatch of the Press Trust of India (PTI) dated September 10, 1949 states that Ambedkar was among those who sponsored an amendment making Sanskrit as the official language of the Indian Union in place of Hindi. Most newspapers carried the news the next day, i.e., on September 11, 1949 (see the issue of Sambhashan Sandeshah, a Sanskrit monthly published from Delhi , June 2003: 4-6).
Other dignitaries who supported Dr Ambedkar’s initiative included Dr B.V. Keskar, then the Deputy Minister for External Affairs and Professor Naziruddin Ahmed. The amendment dealt with Article 310 and read: 1.The official language of the Union shall be Sanskrit. 2. Notwithstanding anything contained in Clause 1 of this article, for a period of fifteen years from the commencement of this constitution, the English language shall continue to be used for the official purposes of the union for which it was being used at such commencement: provided that the President may, during the said period, by order authorise for any of the official purposes of the union the use of Sanskrit in addition to the English language . But the amendment was defeated in the Constituent Assembly due to the opposition of the ruling Congress Party and other lobbyists.
If Ambedkar had succeeded, the renewed interaction between Sanskrit as the national language and speakers of other languages would have initiated a sociological process of upward and downward mobility. While rulers, pilgrim centres, and temple complexes used to be the traditional agents of such interaction, the state operated broadcasting agencies, school textbooks, and the film and music industry would have emerged as new agents facilitating that interaction.
Here is another reference from AN Haksar in his review of †The Modernity of Sanskrit †by Simone Sawhney ( who is an acdemic in USA and has written that Sanskirt has been hijacked by Hindu Nationalists) . She misses the point that Dr BR Ambedkar wanted Sanskrit as a national language. Mr AN Haksar has rightly pointed this out. Please google AN Haksar and Simone Sawhney.
Extracts below in †For example….. India’s modernity †from the review of AN Haksar of the book Modernity of Sanskrit in the web site above.
“For example, while the author dwells on the exchanges between Gandhi and Ambedkar on caste and reservation, she omits any notice of Ambedkar’s proposal in the Constituent Assembly to make Sanskrit the official language of the Indian Union. Nor does she note the rich tribute to Sanskrit paid by Nehru, the acclaimed symbol of India’s modernityâ€
The author here is Simone Sawhney and the reviewer AN Haksar.
This below is important, reposting this
“If Ambedkar had succeeded, the renewed interaction between Sanskrit as the national language and speakers of other languages would have initiated a sociological process of upward and downward mobility. While rulers, pilgrim centres, and temple complexes used to be the traditional agents of such interaction, the state operated broadcasting agencies, school textbooks, and the film and music industry would have emerged as new agents facilitating that interaction”
Dear Shantanu
I’m not sure what is the purpose of raising this issue. Well before Macaulay came on the scene, people like Raja Ram Mohun Roy had advocated the opening of English schools.
Thus, “Ram Mohun Roy appeared in 1831 before a parliamentary committee in England studying the renewal of the company’s charter. While giving testimony on the question of free European emigration to India, Roy expressed the opinion that English emigration should be unrestricted since English settlers in India “from motives of benevolence, public spirit, and fellow feeling toward their native neighbours, would establish schools and other seminaries of education for the cultivation of the English language throughout the country, and for the diffusion of a knowledge of European arts and sciences.”” (Elmer H. Cutts, “The Background of Macaulay’s Minute”, The American Historical Review, Vol. 58, No. 4 Jul., 1953, p. 828).
In general, Macaulay is over-rated for his influence on Bentick (Bentick did not need Macaulay’s minute to make up his mind on something he had already decided based on extensive consultation). Macaulay is entitled (as are many Hindus today who oppose Madrassas) to his religious views in a PRIVATE letter to his father. I don’t see why we forget the many good things that Macaulay said about India. He was the FIRST Britisher to look forward to the independence of India.
“by good government we may educate our subjects into a capacity for better government; that, having become instructed in European knowledge, they may, in some future age, demand European institutions. Whether such a day will ever come I know not. But never will I attempt to avert or to retard it. Whenever it comes, it will be the PROUDEST DAY IN ENGLISH HISTORY.” (http://bit.ly/du3gHR)
Macaulay was one of GREATEST fighters for freedom in the 19th century, and his contributions are on par with J.S. Mill’s. Let us assess people based on their ENTIRE contributions and avoid misjudging them, or judging them by our modern standards.
Please show me one Hindu who in his PRIVATE conversation with his family members (say, father) hasn’t railed against Muslims or Christians and said that we must stop their Madrassas and give them MODERN EDUCATION so they can reduce their fanaticism.
Regards
Sanjeev
To complete the loop, and to add a few points, I’ve now published this: http://sabhlokcity.com/2010/10/misrepresentation-of-macaulays-entire-work-through-a-single-private-letter-to-his-father/
There is something to be said for using the right tools for the job. We seem to lay all the faults on English but none for our failure to discern what is best for the job. The English had first to live with Latin as the language of learning and French as the language of the English Court. It made the English learned in the best knowledge that available from ancient sources, and the setter of fashions in the Courts of her kings. It was many hundreds of years later that English came into its own as a language par excellence.
What is that has proved unsatisfactory as regards Sanskrit. For a start, it struggles to be the language of the nation as it has to contend with Tamil as the language of South India which both languages cannot occupy at the same time. Only English has been able to provide the bridge between the two halves. India has been saved from the North – South split extending to religion but at what cost? To make the accommodation Hinduism had to be diverse with a weak center which is then reflected in the governance of a weak central government.
What was wrong with Macaulay wanting Hindus to imitate the best of that British had to offer? Japan had to make the journey to the West to look for the best way to fix their house. They mastered Kant, warfare, established modern representative government when they were jolted by the gunboat diplomacy of the American government. We had two centuries of raping and looting the land of India, and still we spend our time splitting hairs. The media revolution means that that problem is solved for India because English, Hindi and Tamil can occupy the air waves of a multi-language nation. The multiplicity of languages is that not one of them will make it as the language that per se defines India. The only other hope for that is the one ray of light arising from the judgment of Justice Aggarwal in the Ayodhya temple case. He made his appeal for the Ram temple on the basis of the one God Brahma the creator of the Vedas. For Hinduism to make the leap necessary, it needs to arise above the installation of a deity in the temple to one embracing the whole of India and what happens and matters to India as sacred to Hindus. That requires putting aside all the petty concerns of language, caste and sect for the greater good of India.
Macaulay has been much derided for his hopes that by embracing English and Christianity Hindus can become as great as the British. We have instead chosen to drown in obscurantism. If the Supreme Court rises to the challenge as I expect it to, then it is the one transformation agent he introduced we should thank him for.
Rather than the language (english), it is Macaulay’s hidden agenda that was deadly. The neo-Macs again chose English and its extensive vocabulary to propagate their message of divisiveness. Sagarika is their best example of such misuse. I believe that “majoritarianism” is the most recent and longest word-dropping dumped by this bleeding-ear liberal.
One must also note that immediately after independence, English wasn’t as dominating as it is now. Because of IT and internet, and because English makes one more job-worthy, it has thrived in the last decade. A few other languages could easily have stolen a march over English in the interim. That it didn’t happen is entirely due to a lack of vision. I have heard a lot of people talk about nation and nationalism but I know very few who actually took the trouble to learn a second Indian language, and none who has actually bothered to learn a South Indian language if it is not his mother tongue (as per the three-language formula).
Also, there has not been any concerted effort to enrich Indian languages. Imagine discussing science and technology in any Indian language. The trouble is, like Macaulay, people have been thinking of language only as a means to dominate some other group, not as a tool to facilitate knowledge and culture sharing.
@Prakash
You talk about the dominance of English in India but fail to say which of the Indian languages deserves to flourish or which might even be usefully put to death. The truth is just like our gods we refuse to make hard choses. Take something as basic as the name of our country. Why do we still use the name India for Bharat? It either reflects either discomforture about what identified our country in the past, a desire to break with the past, or plain ineptitude. We have been merrily changing the names of our cities but what about the name of our country so crucial to our identity?
If we are so willing to ditch our languages, it is because language has to have a sacred connection. Indian Muslims would happily learn Urdue for the direct connection with their scriptures. India’s sacred books have been the monopoly of Brahmins, it is a bit too late to revive Sanskrit for the purpose. Unlike with Western societies, learning was what well to do people did, not just the priestly classes. There has not therefore been the breadth to sustain the life of languages like Hindi and a few others which deserve to be looked after. Romance itself is related to the idiom of religion, so the language as an artform has not also been sustained. This has even affected the capacity of our society to articulate the course the country has taken. The country looked up to Nehru and Gandhi with their easy facility in English but who in my opinion were even more detached from the Indian people than the English. We have elect rulers with the same prejuidices.
I am arging this in English, so it is not the fault of the English language. Neither do I blame the Brahmins scholars who kept alive India’s ancient learning. It comes down to the construct of Hindu society, and the barriers it has chosen to live by. As this is how Hindu society is defined, there is no one to question it except it has to be said an outsider. Until India’s identity is properly, sorted out, study and research of India’s ancient learning will not be passed down as the duty of the nation.
@Sanjeev,
” I don’t see why we forget the many good things that Macaulay said about India”
Please show us some of these ‘many good things that Macaulay said about India’
Regards
Sandeep
http://www.scribd.com/doc/10932582/The-Beautiful-Tree-of-Indigenous-Indian-Education-in-the-18th-Century
Dharampal;s book is available for all to read. Very honest. THE BEAUTIFUL TREE IS A MUST READ. THIS MAN WAS SIDELINED BY EMINENT HISTORIANS, EVEN THOUGH HE WAS A TRUE GANDHIAN.
THIS BOOK IS ALSO AVAILABLE FOR DOWNLOADING IN
http://www.samanvaya.com/dharampal/
SEE PUBLISHED WORKS THE TAB ON YOUR LEFT SIDE OF THE ABOVE SITE, YOU WILL GET ALL THESE BKS FOR DOWNLOADING. ALL MUST READ. VERY RIGOROUS WORK. EXCELLENT WORK.
Dharampal Collected Writings in 5 Volumes was brought out in 2000 by Other India Press. This compilation consisted of the following:
(Courtesy Multiversity; Permissions from Other India Press)
Vol 1: Indian Science and Technology in the Eighteenth Century
Vol 2: Civil Disobedience in the Indian Tradition
Vol 3: The Beautiful Tree Indigenous Indian Education in the Eighteenth Century
Vol 4: Panchayat Raj and India’s polity
Vol 5: Essays on Tradition, Recovery and Freedom (which included the Bharatiya Chit, Manas and Kaal)
A shocking (and not very well-known, I suspect) excerpt from a review of a Macaulay’s biography authored by Robert E. Sullivan
…Back in Britain, Macaulay was away from power but was influential. He was a champion of the Empire, of Progress and of Utility. He was also an advocate of genocide. He wrote, “it is in truth more merciful to extirpate a hundred thousand human beings at once, and to fill the void with a well-governed population, than to misgovern millions through a long succession of generations’’. Sullivan locates Macaulay’s “tragedy’’ in this double facedness: the champion of Progress who could advocate murder. But such contrary views are well known among paladins of empire, and the British Empire in India had no better high priest than Thomas Babington Macaulay.
A brief excerpt from IS THE ANGLOPHILE RIGHT A PRISONER OF THE WESTERN PARADIGM?:
..
“Every village has a schoolâ€, Sir Thomas Munro. “There is hardly a village, great or small, throughout our territories, in which there is not at least one school, and in larger villages, more.†G L Prendergast, 1820. “There are 1,00,000 village schools in Bengal and Bihar aloneâ€. William Adam 1830. (The Legend of the Hundred Thousand Schools). Further reports to London from the local Collectors state that the duration of study varied between 5 to 15 years and all the four castes were represented amongst the students. Contrast this with England. The total number of schools, both private and public, in England, in 1801 was 3,363. The total number attending those schools was around 40,000 and “…the average length of school life rises on a favourable estimate from about 1 year in 1835 to about 2 years in 1851â€.
…
[1] All the information, figures and quotes (not attributable to JAP) are taken from Dharampal’s Collected Writings in 5 volumes. These books can be downloaded from http://www.samanvaya.com/dharampal I strongly exhort everybody to put them on their reading lists (at least as the 101st!). They are certainly useful for paradigm shifts!
An exchange triggered by this facebook post:
“A friend alerted me to this article from Sagarika Ghose yesterday, “Rename secularism. Call it ‘dharma’ or righteous administration” (read it here: http://j.mp/YV9MHH)
What struck me instantly was not the sentiment – but the way it was phrased…
It felt awkward and artificial…
Then I realized why it felt awkward.
Instead of simply saying “Dharma is Secularism”, she had used the awkward phrasing of “Secularism should be renamed as Dharmaâ€!
This is what Macaulay dreamed of…
Indians re-packaging their concepts in the western/Christian idiom…
This “conditioning” (thanks to our education system) goes deep .
For instance, a few weeks ago, we had this tweet from Doordarshan:
“The Machiavelli of Indian Politics speaks …..DON’T MISS ‪#‎Chanakya‬ every Sunday at 10 am only on @DDNational..”
When would this obsession with western points of reference end?
जय हिंद, जय à¤à¤¾à¤°à¤¤! – शांतनà¥
*** A few comments that triggered a discussion below…
Gaurav Sharma: Macaulay did not dream anything about India apart from what colonial masters used to (not that we know his dreams). But I think he implemented English for administrative ease not as some grand cultural reprogramming scheme or conspiracy. So stop obsessing with Macaulay.
As for Dharma, there is no equivalent word in english. And that is true. Dharma roughly can be translated as “righteous duty” though it strips the word off its meaning and essense. Dharma is also not religion since religion is about worship of a godhead. Wheras there are different dharmas…like PutraDharma, RajDharma. Sagrika has confused and narrowed dharma while she was implying rajdharma. But why blame Sagrika or a distant Macaulay for that ! How many of us Indians know what dharma means !
Shantanu Bhagwat Gaurav: Pl read https://satyameva-jayate.org/…/11/english-schools-macaulay/
You might change your views about him and his motives…
P.S. I am puzzled by your use of the word “obsessing”. Where is that coming from? Or have you been reading too much of him lately?
Gaurav Sharma: @shantanu I used word obsessing for your post as is clear from other links you refered on subject. Macaulay’s view on Indians were same as most colonists of time. He was coming from Europe that had seen dawn of age of reason and science and saw native cultures as lower. But he doesnt appear to have had great diabolic designs to subvert a supposedly greater native culture. He is made more villainous than he perhaps was as it suits a certain narrative. (Atleast you have clarified that his famous quote that one can find on thousand sites was merely an internet hoax). When English arrived in India to colonize, India was reeling under Islamic rule snd invasions of close to 600 years.Dominant languages were hindustani,urdu,Arabic and Persian. The hindus had fallen to dark ages already. Ajanta Ellora laid burried in ravines of a jungle for thousand years and took an English captain to stumble upon and discover it.
I dont see the point of bringing in Macaulay to critique an article written by journalist in 2014. One could dig holes in her half baked article without harking bck to past.
Shantanu Bhagwat: Gaurav: It is still not clear to me as to how 2 links can be called “obsessing” but I will let that pass…On to the other points:
1] Re. “He doesn’t appear to have had great diabolic designs…”, this is open to discussion/interpretation (I think)..Each of those words is loaded: great, diabolic, design!
2] British did not ‘took over’ India from Mughals/ Islamic rule but the Marathas and the Sikhs
3] India in the 18th and 19th c. was still fairly prosperous, advanced and a significant creator of wealth (this is not to say everything was gloriously wonderful). See e.g. https://satyameva-jayate.org/…/30/loot-east-india-company/ and https://satyameva-jayate.org/…/economic-exploitation…/ and http://varnam.org/blog/2007/11/the_benevolent_empire/
4] I brought Macaulay in the argument as a symbol of the slavish mentality, the deep unease that the educated elite have about the past, the culture and traditions, and the reason behind the “obsession with western points of reference”.
I can go on but would prefer to continue this debate/discussion over at the blog (if you wish, that is). Have added your comment, my response and a few others to this thread https://satyameva-jayate.org/…/11/english-schools-macaulay/ – pl feel free to join me there
***