Retrospect of principal educational facts during the last ten years necessary. 9. The arguments adduced in the few last paragraphs appear to show that a careful examination of the real facts, and an analysis of the principal phenomena, which have displayed themselves in the course of educational proceedings in this Presidency, would not be without their uses, if made with sufficient industry and impartiality to ensure confidence, and with a firm determination to steer clear of bootless controversy and all speculative inquiries. The present epoch, also, appears especially to commend itself for such a retrospect, as in 1850 the second decennial period commenced, during which the schools of the Presidency have come under the exclusive control of a Government Board; and it is obvious that as a considerable body of information ought now to have been accumulated, and as the majority of the present members have had seats at the Board during the greater portion of that time, they would fain hope that by recording their experience, they may shed some light on certain obscure but highly interesting questions, which are certain to arise from time to time be. fore their successors at this Board. 10. We now proceed to give as minute a detail as comports with our limits, of the principal educational facts which have forced themselves upon our notice, and we think it will clearly appear, when these facts are duly appre A uniform system developing itself spontaneously both in Bengal and Bombay. tion for educational purposes in this Presidency is Rs. 1,25,000, or say £12,500; but the College at Haileybury, by the published accounts laid before Parliament, cost gross £18,637 58. in 1830-31, for the instruction of 73 individuals, and in the previous year the net cost to Government was £14,908 28. 10d. Addiscombe, in the two corresponding years, cost Government, net, £14,570 10s. 2d., and £16,075 78. 2d., respectively. See Commons' Report on East Indian Affairs, 1832, Vol. 3, Finance, App. 414. ciated, that many of the disputed questions which arise in the Indian field of education will be seen to solve themselves, and that a system is gradually evolving itself in other Presidencies, as well as in Bombay, which is well suited to the circumstances of the country, and which, as the growth of spontaneous development, denotes that general causes are at work to call it forth.* 11. In the Return on the following page, a comparative view is given of the number of schools and of pupils receiving education under Government, at Statistics of educa tion in Bombay. the period when the Establishments first came under the control of the Board, in 1840, and in April 1850. It shows, in the latter period, an addition of four English and of eighty-three vernacular schools, and a general increase in pupils of above a hundred per cent. The total number receiving Government education at the present time is 12,712, in the following proportions :— English education....... 1,699 Vernacular ditto........10,730 Sanskrit ditto.... 283 The employment of English as an instrument of communication, both oral and written, between educated Natives, has been observed on in Bengal as a growing custom. Exactly the same practice has prevailed in Bombay for years past, nor is it confined to the educated classes, for even those who have but a smattering of the language will be often found to adopt it in their correspondence, a recent example of which occurs in the late enquiries under the Wheel-Tax Commission, as appears by the reports of the proceedings in the public newspapers. Return of the Number of Pupils receiving Education under Government in 1840 and 1850 respectively, in the Bombay Presidency. Same subject. now calculated by the most com petent authorities to amount to ten millions. Now, on applying the rule of statistics deduced from the Prussian census as noticed in a former Report,* Report of Board of Education for 1842, page 26. As the rule is often useful in practice, it may be well to re-state it: In a population consisting of many millions, the children from one day to fourteen years old may be taken at 42 per cent. Three-sevenths of these are computed to be of a population of this amount will be found to contain no fewer than 900,000 male children, between the ages of seven and fourteen years, and, of course, fit subjects for school. It follows, therefore, that Government at this Presidency has not been able to afford an opportunity for obtaining education to more than one out of every sixtynine boys of the proper school-going age. 13. Further, it is admitted that the education afforded in the vernacular Schools is far Same subject. from efficient. A great portion of the strictures in Mr. Willoughby's Minute is directed against the defective character and insignificant results of these Schools.* The Board not only acknowledge this fact, but they have been studious to point it out prominently for many years past, and, indeed, in the opinion of some competent observers, have drawn too unfavorable a picture of the vernacular Schools. But what are the obvious remedies for the defects indicated? Mr. Willoughby describes them very correctly,-a superior class of schoolmasters, normal schools, more efficient supervision, additions to the vernacular literature. These are all subjects, however, which have occupied the atttention of the Board for many years past, and as to which not a step can be made in advance without additional expenditure. But we are given to understand from the letter of your Lordship in Council that "it is not probable the Government will have the power, for a considerable time to come, to afford the Board additional pecuniary assistance." 14. It results most clearly from these facts, that if school-going age, viz. from seven to fourteen; and by taking half this number, so as to exclude girls, the number 900,000, given in the text, is arrived at. *92 of these Schools were founded before the establishment of the Board of Education. Conclusion, that no means exist for educating the masses. Views of Court of Directors as to the best method of operation with limited means. sufficient funds are not available to put 175 vernacular Schools into a due state of organization, and to give a sound elementary education to 10,730 boys, all question as to educating "the masses"-the "140 millions"-the 900,000 boys in the Bombay Presidency, disappears. The object is not one that can be attained or approximated to by Government, and Educational Boards ought not to allow themselves to be distracted from a more limited practicable field of action by the visionary speculations of uninformed benevolence. 15. The Hon'ble Court appear to have always kept the conclusion which has been arrived at in the last paragraph very distinctly in view. Perceiving that their educational efforts to improve the people could only be attempted on a very small scale, they have deemed it necessary to point out to their different Governments the true method of producing the greatest results with limited means. have already cited their injunctions to the Madras Government on this head, in para. 7, and their Despatch to this Government on the same date enforces sentiments of exactly the same import :-" It is our anxious desire to afford to the higher classes of the Natives of India the means of instruction in European science, and of access to the literature of civilized Europe. The character which may be given to the classes possessed of leisure and natural influence ultimately determines that of the whole people." 16. We It being then demonstrated that only a small section of the population can be brought under the influences of Government education in India, and the Inquiry as to upper classes of India. Hon'ble Court having in effect decided that this section Despatch to the Government of Bombay, September 29th, 1830. |