Decolonization(s) and Education. Daniel Maul

as well as lower caste boys by stating that, “if the beggarly Brahmins are freely admitted into the government schools, what is there to prevent all the despised castes - the Dhers, Mahars from flocking in numbers […] If education is open to men of superior intelligence from any community, and with such qualifications there would be nothing to prevent their aspiring to the highest offices open to native talent.”³³

      In spite of these elitist measures, the poor students formed the majority of the school and college-going children during the colonial period. The British headmasters often ignored the government directives to remove poor students from schools.³⁴ Secondly, the missionaries extended free education to all. The leading members of the Indian National Congress like Dadabhai Naoroji and ←51 | 52→Gopal Krishna Gokhale who fought for radical social, economic and educational reforms had risen from poverty. So both the Indian tradition and the existing social reality pointed in the same direction; namely that, what India needed was equal educational access and good quality education for all.

      Nationalising an imperial idea

      The leading anti-colonial political leaders like Bal Gangadhar Tilak and Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi had, however, different ideas on what constituted an education for Indians. By rejecting the reformers as “anglicised, un-national leaders,”³⁵ Tilak and later Gandhi attempted to provide an alternative socio-educational philosophy that had a far-reaching impact on education.

      Tilak came from a family of landlords, moneylenders and government officials. He entered the public arena in 1881, through his weekly publication The Mahratta. He used it effectively to oppose colonial policies and to attack the reformers. He defended the caste system in the name of “cleanliness,” and declared that “the Hindu religion owed its existence to the caste system.”³⁶ The term caste is a modern one, and the Hindu religious texts refer to this stratification as chaturvarna or four-fold division and the system which specifies how each caste should behave, follow certain occupations and punishment for those who transcend it is referred to as varnashrama dharma. Tilak used all three terms, sometimes in the same speech or editorial.

      To begin with, Tilak was not against modern education. He actually declared that “we were an ignorant mass of people,” before its “civilising influence.”³⁷ However, he opposed the reformers’ campaign for equal educational access for all sections of the society by arguing that, such a measure took the lower castes away from their traditional occupation and traditional existence:

      You take away a farmer’s boy from the plough, the blacksmith’s boy from the bellows and the cobbler’s boy from his awl with the object of giving him liberal education, […] you remove him from a sphere where he would have been contented happy and useful to those who depend upon him and teach him to be discontented with his lot and with the government.³⁸

      ←52 | 53→

      Tilak emphasised that teaching a modern curriculum for the lower castes had “no earthly use in practical life,” and would actually “do more harm than good to them.” He insisted that they should be taught “only those subjects which would be necessary for their living, […] befitting their rank and station in life.” They should be taught “most ordinary trades like those of a carpenter, blacksmith mason and tailor.”³⁹ Later he urged the government to remodel the courses prescribed for rural schools and “introduce in them agricultural subjects such as preparing of soil, the tending of bullocks, the implements of husbandry etc.”⁴⁰ He asked the colonial government to limit English education to affluent Brahmins and set up separate schools to meet the educational requirements of “variously civilized communities.”⁴¹ Against this background, it is hardly surprising that he openly opposed the admission of boys from untouchable castes into schools.⁴²

      What is interesting in these early discussions is that, Tilak although he called himself a nationalist, yet warned the colonial government “that the interests of the society and the government are similar […] by placing the latest results arrived at by moral and political science in a young graduate’s hand the government is encouraging the reformers to ask for extreme reforms in the society which would lead to reformers demanding similar extreme reform in the governance.”⁴³

      By 1891, Tilak changed his stand. The British and Indian reformers were successful in getting the Age of Consent Bill passed. This Bill was introduced in the Imperial Legislature by Andrew Scoble and Dayaram Gidumal and was a limited measure, aiming at the abolishment of child marriage and meant to raise the marriageable age of girls to 12. During the debate, the reformers argued that the additional years secured in a girls’ life could be used to educate them. Tilak vehemently opposed it by arguing that if girls were educated “India would lose its nationality its individuality as a separate nation”.⁴⁴ By quoting the British newspapers, he argued that “the brain of a woman on an average weighed less by five ounces than that of a man.”⁴⁵ He even stated that women reformers like Rakmabais, Pandita Ramabai “should be punished for the same reason as there ←53 | 54→is punishment for thieves, adulterers and murderers.”⁴⁶ After the passing of the Age of Consent Act, Tilak became a vocal advocate of anti-colonial nationalism and national education. He placed the traditional caste hierarchy - varnashrama dharma at the heart of the Indian nationhood and argued that “had it not been for the influence of caste, the Hindu nation would have long ceased to exist.” He asserted that activities of the reformers “would kill the caste and with it kill the vitality of the nation.”⁴⁷ Since modern education undermined “respect for old institutions and beliefs” and led to “religious nihilism,” it was a great impediment to Indian nationalism.⁴⁸ Tilak argued that religious and vocational education alone should form the basis of the curriculum to restore respect for “old institutions, old values and old idol”. Tilak explained that with “old institution” he was referring to the caste stratification and by “old values” he hinted to the honour and respect paid by the lower castes to the “old idol”, the Brahmins.⁴⁹ Since modern education had upturned all three, national education was vital to re-construct a strong Indian nation.⁵⁰ Tilak opposed the teaching of Sanskrit poetry or even Hindu philosophy. He explained that “much of the religious instruction should consist of dogma pure and simple. The schoolboys will have to be told dogmatically that there is God […] of course; the schoolboy who wants an ocular proof of the existence of God will have to be caned into silence.”⁵¹

      Tilak and his supporters established national schools during the first phase of anti-colonial struggle (called the Swadeshi movement, 1905–1912). These schools were not popular with the people and soon disappeared. The quality of literacy that was advocated in the schools was very low. They opposed the efforts of Gopal Krishna Gokhale’s Compulsory Education Bill 1912 and the efforts of the Maharaja of Baroda to implement compulsory education in his province.⁵² During the public debates surrounding the passing of the Compulsory Education Bill, they argued that “the soul of education is really information; hence, it is sufficient to give information to boys.” Since everybody loves to write his name, ←54 | 55→he should be taught to do so. They also suggested “the appointment of a music master to play music in public and arrange