7 Civilising the “Native”, Educating the Nation

1 81 Civilising the Native , Educating the Nation7In the earlier chapters you have seen how British rule affectedrajas and nawabs, peasants and tribals. In this chapter wewill try and understand what implication it had for thelives of students. For, the British in India wanted not onlyterritorial conquest and control over revenues. They also feltthat they had a cultural mission: they had to civilise thenatives , change their customs and changes were to be introduced? How were Indiansto be educated, civilised , and made into what the Britishbelieved were good subjects ? The British could findno simple answers to these questions. They continued tobe debated for many the British saw EducationLet us look at what the British thought anddid, and how some of the ideas of educationthat we now take for granted evolved in thelast two hundred years.

2 In the process of thisenquiry we will also see how Indians reactedto British ideas, and how they developedtheir own views about how Indians were tobe tradition of OrientalismIn 1783, a person named William Jonesarrived in Calcutta. He had an appointmentas a junior judge at the Supreme Court thatthe Company had set up. In addition to beingan expert in law, Jones was a linguist. Hehad studied Greek and Latin at Oxford, knewFrench and English, had picked up Arabicfrom a friend, and had also learnt Calcutta, he began spending many hoursa day with pandits who taught him thesubtleties of Sanskrit language, grammar andFig. 1 Fig. 1 Fig. 1 Fig. 1 Fig. 1 William Jones learning PersianLinguist Someonewho knows andstudies severallanguages2022-23 OUR PASTS III82poetry.

3 Soon he was studying ancient Indian texts onlaw, philosophy, religion, politics, morality, arithmetic,medicine and the other discovered that his interests were shared bymany British officials living in Calcutta at the like Henry Thomas Colebrooke and NathanielHalhed were also busy discovering the ancient Indianheritage, mastering Indian languages and translatingSanskrit and Persian works into English. Together withthem, Jones set up the Asiatic Society of bengal , andstarted a journal called Asiatick and Colebrooke came to represent a particularattitude towards India. They shared a deep respect forancient cultures, both of India and the west . Indiancivilisation, they felt, had attained its glory in the ancientpast, but had subsequently declined.

4 In order tounderstand India it was necessary to discover the sacredand legal texts that were produced in the ancient only those texts could reveal the real ideas and lawsof the Hindus and Muslims, and only a new study of thesetexts could form the basis of future development in Jones and Colebrooke went about discoveringancient texts, understanding their meaning, translatingthem, and making their findings known to others. Thisproject, they believed, would not only help the British learnfrom Indian culture, but it would also help Indiansrediscover their own heritage, and understand the lostglories of their past. In this process the British would becomethe guardians of Indian culture as well as its by such ideas, many Company officialsargued that the British ought to promote Indian ratherthan Western learning.

5 They felt that institutions shouldbe set up to encourage the study of ancient Indian textsand teach Sanskrit and Persian literature and officials also thought that Hindus and Muslimsought to be taught what they were already familiar with,and what they valued and treasured, not subjects thatwere alien to them. Only then, they believed, could theBritish hope to win a place in the hearts of the natives ;only then could the alien rulers expect to be respected bytheir this object in view a madrasa was set up inCalcutta in 1781 to promote the study of Arabic, Persianand Islamic law; and the Hindu College was establishedin Benaras in 1791 to encourage the study of ancientSanskrit texts that would be useful for the administrationof the An Arabicword for a place oflearning; any type ofschool or collegeFig.

6 2 Fig. 2 Fig. 2 Fig. 2 Fig. 2 Henry ThomasColebrookeHe was a scholar of Sanskritand ancient sacred writingsof all officials shared these views. Many were verystrong in their criticism of the Orientalists. Grave errors of the East From the early nineteenth century many British officialsbegan to criticise the Orientalist vision of learning. Theysaid that knowledge of the East was full of errors andunscientific thought; Eastern literature was non-seriousand light-hearted. So they argued that it was wrong onthe part of the British to spend so much effort inencouraging the study of Arabic and Sanskrit languageand Mill was one of those who attacked theOrientalists. The British effort, he declared, should notbe to teach what the natives wanted, or what theyrespected, in order to please them and win a place intheir heart.

7 The aim of education ought to be to teachwhat was useful and practical. So Indians should bemade familiar with the scientific and technical advancesthat the west had made, rather than with the poetryand sacred literature of the the 1830s the attack on the Orientalists becamesharper. One of the most outspoken and influential ofsuch critics of the time was Thomas BabingtonMacaulay. He saw India as an uncivilised country thatneeded to be civilised. No branch of Eastern knowledge,according to him could be compared to what Englandhad produced. Who could deny, declared Macaulay, thatOrientalists Thosewith a scholarlyknowledge of thelanguage and cultureof AsiaMunshiMunshiMunshiMunshiMunshi A person whocan read, write andteach PersianVernacular A termgenerally used to referto a local language ordialect as distinct fromwhat is seen as thestandard language.

8 Incolonial countries likeIndia, the British usedthe term to mark thedifference between thelocal languages ofeveryday use andEnglish the languageof the imperial 3 Fig. 3 Fig. 3 Fig. 3 Fig. 3 Monument to Warren Hastings, byRichard Westmacott, 1830, now in VictoriaMemorial in CalcuttaThis image represents how Orientaliststhought of British power in India. You willnotice that the majestic figure of Hastings,an enthusiastic supporter of the Orientalists,is placed between the standing figure of apandit on one side and a seated munshion the other side. Hastings and otherOrientalists needed Indian scholars to teachthem the vernacular languages, tell themabout local customs and laws, and helpthem translate and interpret ancient took the initiative to set up theCalcutta Madrasa, and believed that theancient customs of the country and Orientallearning ought to be the basis of British rulein THE NATIVE , Educating THE NATION2022-23 OUR PASTS III84 a single shelf of a goodEuropean library was worth thewhole native literature of Indiaand Arabia.

9 He urged that theBritish government in Indiastop wasting public money inpromoting Oriental learning,for it was of no practical great energy andpassion, Macaulay emphasisedthe need to teach the Englishlanguage. He felt that knowledgeof English would allow Indiansto read some of the finestliterature the world had produced;it would make them aware ofthe developments in Westernscience and philosophy. Teaching of English could thusbe a way of Civilising people, changing their tastes,values and Macaulay s minute, the English EducationAct of 1835 was introduced. The decision was to makeEnglish the medium of instruction for higher education,and to stop the promotion of Oriental institutions likethe Calcutta Madrasa and Benaras Sanskrit institutions were seen as temples of darknessthat were falling of themselves into decay.

10 Englishtextbooks now began to be produced for for commerceIn 1854, the Court of Directors of the East IndiaCompany in London sent an educational despatch tothe Governor-General in India. Issued by Charles Wood,the President of the Board of Control of the Company,it has come to be known as Wood s Despatch. Outliningthe educational policy that was to be followed in India,it emphasised once again the practical benefits of asystem of European learning, as opposed to of the practical uses the Despatch pointed towas economic. European learning, it said, would enableIndians to recognise the advantages that flow from theexpansion of trade and commerce, and make them seethe importance of developing the resources of thecountry.