Effects and Imprints of Colonisation and Imperialism on its colony: "An overview of British monarchy on education in India”.

“Veni, vidi, vici. (I came, I saw, I conquered.)”

― Gaius Iulius Caesar

Since, the birth of early human; the pages of histories have been trailed with anecdote of human travel. The archeological evidence over the decades support and explains this trail of human civilisation for food, belonging or shelter or etc. The trace reveals footprints of early mankind first as a gatherer on feet then on wheel as farmers then to ship voyages as an explorer in thirst of adventures and anything new. But with the progression of time the quench of thirst was replaced by adrenaline rush pumping lust for overcoming power of lust and control of people and new territories. The desire to glorify one’s territories and create monument in their names was fulfilled by annexing other territories and creating one’s nation. From the Valkyries in barbarian ages to Romans and etc. in Gothic era. The history repeats itself along the progression of time in each era with the rise of nation and power like Mughals, French, Spanish, Britishers, Dutch and etc. in search of new colonies and territories for better trade, opportunities and ways to quench their libido of power. Barbaric Wars have been waged and endless ship sailed across shore to never return back again home again. The tide of times have witnessed plethora of such incident and this drive led to coining of new term named as Imperialism. This era was termed as an era of colony and coloniser and term such as imperialism were coined.Through this article i would like to shed light upon the effect and consequences of British Imperialism on Indian education system.

The term Imperialism implies a policy of extending a country’s power and influence through colonization, use of military force, or other means. It constitute of take over and rule of stronger nation over weaker nation for their own personal profit and exploit the undeveloped in order for capitalism to function. Acc. to a law in classical physics by Sir Isaac Newton it states that: ”Every action has equal and opposite reaction”. Similarly, When a coloniser mother country colonised a weaker country as their colony it has got positive and negative impact. The Britishers were active in India for around around 200 odd years as a colonisers, but before going into further details, there are certain questions that need to be explored like how a small company could take control of such a huge nation and what the impact of imperialism was. Let’s go back to the history of British imperialism.

For the ease of convenience of understanding of British imperialism in India. This article is divided into two main parts.

a). India under the british rule (1601–1857; East India Company & 1857–1947 Britain throne).

b). Independent India (1947- present)

Introduction: The Europe pretext of trade; a beginning.

Let’s start the history of imperialism from the first encounter of european on indian soil. As indian spices, indian wealth was world famous and this fact has led to the tryst with foreign invaders on indian soil again and again. Beginning with the Mughals from the Afghans to Europeans later. Let’s take a whirl in time and look into the brief history of meeting of europeans from the far west corners of world map by sea route. It was on May 20, 1948 when Vasco De Gama arrived to calicut via sea route. This event marked the beginning of european traders on indian soil. The Portuguese were the first to trade with Goa in 1510 and started making their colony to control territory and trade routes namely Diu, Bassein and Mangalore were their first colony.

On 31 December 1600, a group of merchants who had incorporated themselves into the East India Company were given monopoly privileges on all trade with the East Indies. In 1601 the East India Company was chartered, and the English began their first inroads into the Indian Ocean. The reason for the establishment of trade post was particularly in basic commodities including cotton, silk, indigo dye, salt, saltpetre, tea and opium. But, the East India Company had the unusual distinction of ruling an entire country. Its origins were much humbler in the beginning.It first arrived in India on the port of Surat in 1608. By 1610, the British chased away a Portuguese naval squadron, and the East India Company created its own outpost at Surat. This small outpost marked the beginning of a remarkable presence that would last over 300 years and eventually dominate the entire subcontinent. In 1612 British established a trading post in Gujarat. To establish a much stronger hold by East India Company on the trading post on 1614 Sir Thomas Roe went to meet the mughal emperor Jahangir as emissary of King James I. The success of this meeting marked a friendly treaty between the mughal emperor Jahangir and the east india company. As a part of the commercial treaty they were allowed to establish sites for commercial agencies and hence they started setting up factories in return for exclusive exotic gifts from europeans market and royal favour for the mughal kingdom. By 1615 the first trade post was established in Surat and later it spread to Ahmedabad, Broach and Agra and so on. Some of the major highlight during the port seizure was occupancy of Madras by 1640 as a post and by 1661 Mumbai too was looped in from Charles II and converted into flourishing center for trade by 1668. As trade grew further, extensive and more profitable a need was felt to establish a trade centre and it was in later era between 1690–1698 when Suntanati, Kalikatta and Gobindpore were developed into single area and Calcutta was established. As the post were mushrooming along the east and west coast a considerable amount of resident englishmen establish three major presidency town namely Madras, Calcutta and Bombay out of which Calcutta became the trading capital of east india company. With a constant need to establish themselves superior and gain more profit a lot of war had been waged along the tide of time in between their trade competitor the Portuguese, Dutch and the French, but by applying clear successful war tactics and strategic/deft alliance with local princes they finally won the stronghold in trade. In 1717, the Company achieved its hitherto most notable success when it received a firman or royal dictat from the Mughal Emperor exempting the Company from the payment of custom duties in Bengal. Once the dog fight turned in their favour they eclipsed the portuguese hold on trade on Indie channel completely and by 1769 the company gained sole exclusive trade right to trade to all european channel. This two event marked a massive expansion of their trading operation on Indian soil and thus the traders became conqueror or coloniser of Indian land and soul.

Establishment of East India Imperialism: British Monarch

The company by then had established themselves as a ruler of India and slowly and slowly annexed the complete indian subcontinent overpowering the local nawab, hindu ruler and mughals. Once they controlled the port in the beginning now ruled the country. The reason for their stronghold are mainly because of two points:

a). Presence of strong army, ballistic arms and gunpowder and

b). Callousness by the local ruler on the control of port for trade, as their main source of wealth was derived from the agrarian taxes.

Once the rule was established they analyzed the political, social and economic existing policy and impose their own thinking on Indians. Over the course of their rule, they implied their own preaching on Indian social model of society in terms of policy, principle and social practise. The lens that they choose to view the fabric of indian society were weaved in the string of esteemed english gentlemen and to them Indians were barbaric and needed to be reformed by salvation. Christianity as the means and english as the tools they tried to reform indian society to establish a population of educated indians who can speak their language and are indians by birth but englishman by principle, habits and mind. This tasteful indians englishmen were handful from selected section of society who managed and ease the east India company operation. This cadre of educated indians only sparked the nationalist consciousness in Indians mind later.

Britishers and their influence on education policy in India

“In India, English is the language spoken by the ruling class. Those Indians of the high class who are in government also speak it… We must do our best to form a class who may be interpreters between us and the millions whom we govern, a class of persons Indian in blood and colour, but English in taste, in opinions, words and intellect.”

• Lord Macaulay

It would be fairly wrong to say if Indians were uneducated before their rule. In fact the companies was fairly uninterested in spreading education or interfering in social practise. According to government and church records there were 80,000 traditional institution imparting oriental teaching i.e., local native learning, were in Bengal alone which means that there was one institution for every four hundred people. This fact were highlighted even in the survey of Madras, Punjab and Bombay. There was at least one school in every village of India. Mostly the preaching in this school based on ancient text were in Arabic, Persian and Sanskrit.

The western scholar also promoted such form of learning and they always promoted oriental teaching namely; Warren Hastings, who in 1781 established a Madrasa in Calcutta to encourage the study of Muslim laws along with Arabic and Persian languages. A decade later in 1791 due to the sincere efforts of the British resident, Jonathan Duncan, a Sanskrit College was established to promote the study of Hindu laws and philosophy in Banaras.

Therefore it can be contended that till 19th century, the development of education was only through traditional institutions. The east india company didn’t evince any particular interest in matter of education and the responsibility of imparting education remained only in indian hands.

Advent of importance of English education to Indians

Sir Trevelyan, an important man in the English education system, said,

“There is only one way to turn the thoughts of the Indian nation in another direction. And that is to create Western thoughts among them.” Those youth “who study in our schools and colleges start hating the jungle dictatorship under which their ancestors used to suffer and then they start hoping that their national institutes would be created in the British style.”

• Sir Trevelyan

When trade was surplus and demand was more, It felt the need to cut down on its intra expense and by through understanding and analysis it came to the conclusion that, by hiring Indians in official posts they can maximize their more profit. And hence, the need was felt to create a breed of educated indians who speak their tongue and share similar taste. This class of Indians would be ready to work as clerks on low wages while for the same work the British would demand much higher wages. This would reduce the expenditure on administration. It was also expected to create a class of Indians who were loyal to the British and were not able to relate to other Indians. This class of Indians would be taught to appreciate the culture and opinion of the British. In addition, they would also help to increase the market for British goods. They wanted to use education as a means to strengthen their political authority in the country. They assumed that a few educated Indians would spread English culture to the masses and that they would be able to rule through this class of educated Indians. The British gave jobs to only those Indians who knew English thereby compelling many Indians to go in for English education. Education soon became a monopoly of the rich and the city dwellers.

To promote this strategy the East India Company began to adopt a dual policy in the sphere of education. It discouraged the prevalent system of oriental education and gave importance to western education and English language. The Charter Act of 1813 adopted a provision to spend one lakh rupees per annum for the spread of education in India. Although there was a prolonged debate pertaining to education during the course of a general discussion on the Act of 1813 in the British Parliament, yet the matter continued to generate debate for the next 20 years. Consequently, not even a single penny out of the allocated funds could be spent on education.

The contemporary British scholars were divided into two groups on the issue of development of education in India. One group, called the Orientalists, advocated the promotion of oriental subjects through Indian languages. The other group, called the Anglicists, argued the cause of western sciences and literature in the medium of English language.

In 1829, after assuming the office of the Governor-General of India, Lord William Bentinck, emphasized on the medium of English language in Indian education. In the beginning of 1835, the 10 members of the General Committee of Public Instruction were clearly divided into two equal groups. Five members including the Chairman of the committee Lord Macaulay were in favour of adopting English as medium of public instruction whereas the other five were in favour of oriental languages.

The stalemate continued till 2 February 1835 when the Chairman of the committee, Lord Macaulay announced his famous Minute advocating the Anglicist point of view. Consequently, despite fierce opposition from all quarters, Bentinck got the resolution passed on 7 March 1835 which declared that henceforth, government funds would be utilized for the promotion of western literature and science through the medium of English language.

In 1857, when the first war of indian national independence was waged lot of question was raised and the power was shifted from the east india company to british monarchy directly. At that event they tried to strategize a plan to avoid such political nationalist outbreak in future. One of the major steps taken at that time was to increase the feeling of trust in british rule. Sir Trevelyan, One of the most notable english educationalist said in the british parliament that: “After such an education, a political revolution in this country will be unlikely and we will easily be able to rule over our Empire for long.

“If the British want to rule India forever, they will then have to pay a great deal of attention to education. If the British want the youth to forget the thoughts of independence and patriotism, then education will be like a fire fighter in this regard — Indians will then not rise up against us.

In Trevelyan’s opinion, “By increasing education and by giving jobs to more and more Indians, the British rule can be made permanent.” Education was made the means of getting government jobs and the highest ambition of the youth was restricted to getting such jobs. This process has fully continued after independence and the fight to get one’s share in it has emerged as a strong political current.

Everyone knows how the Indians in government jobs during the British Raj behaved towards those fighting for freedom. How lakhs of Indians working in the police, bureaucracy and legal system used to hate the Indian people and oppress them.

The new education system became a strong means to create the cultural system of imperialism in India as well as in the other colonies. In this education system, knowledge was also colonial. It was planned as per the requirements of the colonial rulers. The colonial knowledge not only helped to maintain the hierarchical social system in Indian society based on race and caste, but also greatly contributed towards strengthening British rule. This education produced a feeling of inferiority about our culture and languages in the minds of ordinary Indians. Even today we are not free from these shackles. To this day the common educated Indians have a colonial mentality.

To impose their education system the British had to first destroy the education system prevailing in India since ancient times. This was done at many levels and in many ways. It is obvious that the native education system was neither ideal nor was it non-partisan, but its roots were Indian and it was continuously being developed. It was not a static system, as is commonly said.

The education system prevailing in India before the advent of the British can broadly be looked at as follows:

1. Religious and moral education regarding life values.
2. Education relating to skills, crafts and agriculture.
3. Education relating to philosophy, science, technology and mathematics.
4. Education relating to arts.
5. Education relating to politics and military art.
6. Medical education.

The education system that was established after this destruction has nothing to do with the workers, peasants, language, culture, traditions, history, literature, science, medical science, religion, or philosophy of the soil of this land. This is entirely a system imposed from outside. The present education system has its origin in this system. All the various commissions that were set up in the post independence period for education reforms did not come up with any change that would make a break with the old structure of education and reestablish its link with the land and its people. All that was done was to include what was necessary in the new system. To sum up none of the commissions on education made an attempt to decolonize the education system.

In 1854, Sir Charles Wood sent a comprehensive dispatch as a grand plan on education. The establishment of departments of public instructions in five provinces and introduction of the pattern of grants in aid to encourage private participation in the field of education were recommended. Besides, the dispatch also laid emphasis on the establishment of schools for technical education, teacher and women education. Over and above all these, the dispatch recommended the establishment of one University each in Calcutta, Bombay and Madras, on the model of the London University. Consequently, within the next few years, the Indian education became rapidly westernized.

By expelling the knowledge of labour and life from the ambit of education, the English education gave birth to contempt and negligence towards the laboring masses. By making the knowledge of English the pre-requisite to the task of administration, the education system was converted into a machine to produce “educated slaves” of the British. In addition to this, English education performed the task of producing a new historical outlook.

According to this outlook the natives have no history, no culture. The culture had to be imported from Europe. Divided into castes, religion, tribes in conflict with each other, this society was basically considered as being in uncivilized stage. It was through the arrival of Europeans that enlightenment, culture and justice had been brought to this society. In the society that was gradually moving towards unity, division and discord was deliberately encouraged and institutionalized, becoming a cancer to our society.

Independent India: A trifle after tale of British colonization on Indian Education

“At the stroke of midnight hour, when the world sleeps, India will awake to life and freedom. A moment comes which comes but rarely in history, when we step out from the old to the new, then an age ends, and when the soul of a nation, long suppressed, finds utterance.”

• Jawaharlal Nehru

Those were the words from the India’s then prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru at the eve of India’s Independence. Although a deep scar was left imprint on the pages of history of India with the Lord Mountbatten plan of Partition of creation of Pakistan and West Pakistan, now Bangladesh. A lot of blood turmoil were caused and houses were burnt in the anger and rage of the partition. Its effect were felt not only caused instability but created chaos too in order and peace.

One of the major language of indian fabric since the conception of unified India; Urdu and Persian were condemned and forced to be ceased to exist in Independent India. The people of those linguistic were abandoned and prone to violence. This had an everlasting effect majorly in the parts of Punjab as the majority of the population on the both the side of lines were filtered and sent back to respectives nation. The people who crossed border brought back their spoken dialect and script along with them. The oriental way of teaching mode was deeply shaken and it led to formation of their own indigenous dialect with a hint of the effect of geography that they shared before. The similar effect also occurred in Bangladesh and west bengal from where it was separated.

The borders have been created but the soul still reaches out to their own motherland the old Mother India once called the golden bird. Although along the course of time the condensed regional language got condensed and adulterated and amalgamated with the movement of people across. It led to the formation of new regional language much filtered and simple lingual form. The imprints of past geography can still be seen in the linguistic study of today’s territories.

What the britishers left behind was not only a line divide on political map but they left their tradition and culture. During the aftermath of colonisation it intrigued a deliberate and lingered interaction between two distinct culture. The byproduct of those interaction between the indian and western cultures offered many transitional effect and cultural transformation on our society today. Some of has correctly stated that:” the past shape of our future”. Such thought are still echoing in our tradition today.

The model of society that the britishers devised are still evident today like the current legal system and English as a language. The reminiscent of british past are visible in imperial building like the Rashtrapati Bhavan and Parliament and etc. In culture the concept of clothing in form of pant and trousers is greatly influenced by the Britishers. The food consumption habits like bread, tea and cake, that we consume today are a direct result of our interaction. And many others such example exist.

The concept of britishers to impart english to create a class of educated indians who can speak english has over the period of time evolved into a class of elite. In the present society the thought has been so deeply rooted that one who can’t speak english are considered to be illiterate. Due to such conception the touch of local regional languages are losing its fragrance in indian society today. More and more focus has been towards english in our country today that english speaking is synonym of globalised cosmopolitan person of global taste. In the eye of globalisation the medium of our instruction in our country is predominantly english.

The school, colleges, Govt. Offices, Courthouse and law institution the medium to pass judgement and verdict are in english. English as a lingua franca developed by british to ease the transaction in those time have become an integral part of society. This chain reaction between the colony and coloniser with english as the by product define the social stature and lifestyle of a person.

In the eve of imperialism while capitalism was functioning and prospering. The indians freed as a third world country. Looking at the rule of britishers as its glory days as immediately after the independence it was stricken with famine and riots. The idea of creation of educated indian middle class sees west as role model of modernism and luxury. Even in today’s society the main motive of education today is to go to west. Preferably an english speaking country. This trend can be proved by the seeing the constituents of immigrants in native english speaking country. Most of the tech job, blue collar job are handled by english speaking Indians.

The education system function as a workshop for catering to the need of work force for the factories. The discipline instigated on as are the line of following orders and abandoning creativity and freedom of thought and speech. We are manipulated and made to function like workers since our early days. The idea of closed walls study and the lunch bell are synonyms that register the end and start of task which is similar to those in factory. We are made to listen and express less. Everyone wants to be an engineer or doctor so that they can live their american dreams. Maybe we should contribute our global acceptance to british imperialism for us being able to be stronger in english than any of our counterpart but at what cost are we paying them back. Our culture, history or tradition sacrifice. It was the youth of those time who were exposed to english as a source of change and revolution to change the past that their ancestor suffered. We need to question ourselves if it still hold true in today’s context.

I would like to conclude this article by stating that: “In today’s world we are divided into two separate society’s first world and third world countries. This is due to the actions taken more than 150 years ago during the times of imperialism and colonialism. A major contributor were the British and the colonial rule of India in creating a British India. Colonialism has had a tremendous influence in developing the modernity of the country. We look upto them as role model for a better lifestyle and status quo in society while forgetting our own traditional roots. We aim for a global culture while looking to our colonisers as an idol and english as a medium. It’s time now for us to find our roots and echo our own song of Indianness. We should take pride in our own culture and language and develop a system of education that develop skill rather than the work force for first world country. If we don’t change our mindset now we will be being the free slaves to the western counterpart even when being free”.

Note: This are author view point. It doesn’t mean to harm any community sentiments or feelings. There are no concrete statistic to relate to and al this comment has been based on assumption that the author hear and face in today’s Indian society.