Aryan Books

THE BRITISH MAKEOVER OF INDIA: Indigenous Education and Languages Downgraded

By :- Meenakshi Jain

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Type: English

Pages: 408

Format: Hard Bound

ISBN-13: 978-81-7305-720-5

Edition: 1st

Publisher: ARYAN BOOKS INTERNATIONAL

Size: 15cm x 23cm

Product Year: 2025

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Long centuries before the Common Era, the commitment, continuity, and participation in the transmission of indigenous knowledge was apparent from several sources. An early important agency for the communication of literal and specialized education was the family. There were also references to teachers of noble character, gurus, who imparted knowledge in their ashrams. Later, the presence of organized institutions could be gleaned from temple colleges and mathas of acharyas.

At the beginning of the nineteenth century, indigenous systems of education were in a reasonably good state. British educational surveys, beginning with that of the Madras Presidency under the direction of Governor Thomas Munro, confirmed that.

The colonial state made systematic attempts to undermine the self-sufficient indigenous education systems. Interestingly, a blueprint for the Christianization and Anglicization of India was presented as early as 1792 by the Evangelical, Charles Grant. Thomas B. Macaulay implemented the scheme some four decades later.

While most Company officials in India emphasized the need to retain indigenous vernacular systems, a small group in London and Calcutta pressed for English education. Complicating matters was the growing presence of missionaries, and their determination to proselytize. The Indian resistance to the blandishments of the Company and missionaries was the true story of education in colonial times.

Alongside was the battle against Persian and Urdu by proponents of Hindi, who regarded it as the bearer of indigenous cultural heritage. They viewed the promotion of Persian and Urdu as “the total displacement of the national and traditional for one which is strange, foreign, and uncongenial.”

Preface

Section A
Fluctuating Company Stance on
Indigenous Education – To Applaud or Uproot?

1. Introduction

2. Early Beginnings

3. Some Accounts of Indigenous Education

4. An Evangelical Blueprint for India- Anglicization
and Christianization

5. Initial Endorsement of Indigenous Education
Systems by East India Company

6. Reversal of 1824 – Enter James Mill

7. Bentinck and Macaulay – A Calculated Turn

8. Declaration of Official Policy in Favour of English

9. The Mills and the Education Debate

9. Wood’s Education Despatch – A Triumph of
Missionaries and Anglicists

Section B

Missionaries Enter Field of Education

11. Early Company Policy on Missionaries

12. Education as a Tool of Proselytization

Section C

Reports from the Provinces

13. Madras Presidency Endorsed Vernacular Education

14. Bombay Presidency Approved Vernacular Education

15. William Adam’s Recommendations for Vernacular
Education in Bengal Presidency

16. North-Western Provinces and the Punjab –
Growing Support for Christianization

Section D

The Persian/Urdu/Hindi Controversy

17. Urdu – An Artificial Construct

18. Hindi versus Persian/Urdu

Appendices

Appendix 1: Report of A.D. Campbell

Appendix 2: Report of T.B. Jervis

Appendix 3: Thomas B. Macaulay’s Minute on Education

Appendix 4: Memorandum of Raja Shiv Prasad

Appendix 5: Memorial of 1873

Appendix 6: G.W. Leitner’s Report on Indigenous Education
in the Panjab

References

Index

Meenakshi Jain is a historian interested in cultural and religious developments in Indian history. In 2020, she was awarded Padma Sri by the Government of India for her contributions in the field of literature and education. Her recent publications include – The British Makeover of India: Judicial and Other Indigenous Institutions Upturned (2024); Vishwanath Rises and Rises: The Story of Eternal Kashi (2024); The Hindus of Hindustan (2023); Vasudeva Krishna and Mathura (2021); Flight of Deities and Rebirth of Temples (2019); The Battle for Rama: Case of the Temple at Ayodhya (2017); Sati: Evangelicals, Baptist Missionaries, and the Changing Colonial Discourse (2016); and Rama and Ayodhya (2013).

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