Archive | Education

In the year 1944, Sir John Sargent, the then Educational Adviser to the Government of India, prepared a report on the post­war educational development on the request of the Central Advisory Board of Education.

The Radhakrishnan Committee had lot to say about the University Education but it reviewed the secondary education in the country as well.

In 1917 the Government of India appointed a Commission to study and report on the problems of Calcutta University. Dr. M.E. Sadler, Vice-Chancellor of the University of Leeds, was appointed its Chairman.

The Hunter Commission made the following recom­mendations for the growth of female education in India because it realised that female education had been till now in the most backward condition and needed urgent fostering in every possible way.

The E.I. Company did not make any effort to educate the masses. Most of the Directors believed in the Downward Filtration Theory that education would descend from the higher classes to the lower ones.

Despite the express directives for special expansion of elementary education in the country little progress was made. The reviews of the progress of education made during (1855-80) by the government emphasized the need for expanding the education of the masses.

Lord Auckland succeeded Lord Bentick as India’s Governor- General. Supporters of eastern education presented him with a representation opposing Macaulay’s declaration.

Wood’s Despatch laid down that Government should provide education for those “who are utterly incapable of obtaining education worthy of the name by their own unaided efforts.”

The Hunter Commission was required to enquire into as to what should be the agency for the expansion of secondary education; he was also required to suggest measures for removing defects in the secondary education.

When the recommendations of the Hunter Commission (1882) were implemented, a phenomenal growth of secondary and higher education took place; college and secondary education both expanded enormously.

Lord Curzon by nature was a benevolent autocrat and by training he was a diehard imperialist. He had an implicit faith in a strong rule. As soon as he landed in India he took up the programme of administrative reconstruction in education.

H.R. James called the Wood’s Despatch “the Magna Charta of Indian education”. The Magna Charta was the great Charter of English personal and political liberty obtained from John in 1215. A Charter is the written grants of rights by a sovereign.

Sir Charles Wood, the President of the Board of Control in the coalition ministry of Earl of Aberdeen (1852-55), was a true product of the Palestinian era of English history.

During the British rule in India the downwards filtration theory was adopted in the country. Filtration means coming of something to the bottom from the top.

He was a good orator and could influence others very easily. On June 10, 1834 he became a member of the Governor-General’s Council and was appointed the President of the Committee of Public Instruction.

Indian culture has developed through its system of education. This system was especially fruitful in propagating the ideas of love, truth, non-violence, religion, and peace and world brotherhood.