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Let us discuss the events that led to the preparation of the
Despatch of 1854. It is known to us that the Charter of the East India Company
had to be renewed after every twenty years. Accordingly while renewing the
Charter in 1833 the British Parliament increased the sum of money to one million
yearly from the one lakh in 1813 to be sent on education in India. When the time
for renewal came in 1853, education in India had come to suffer numerous
problems. The directors of the company decided to lay down a definite policy for
education in India. Therefore, it became necessary to make a comprehensive
survey of the entire field of education. As such, a Selection Committee of the
British Parliament was set up in order to institute an enquiry into the measures
for their reforms. The Committee studied the issue thoroughly and reported that
the question of the Indian education should not be ignored and its development
will not be in any case harmful to the British Empire. The suggestions of the
Committee were favourably considered by the Board of Directors. Sir Charles Wood
was the president of the Board of Control. Therefore, the declaration issued on
July 19, 1854 was known as “Wood’s Despatch”, although it is said that the
Despatch was written by the famous thinker John Stuart Mill, a clerk of the
company at that time. On the basis of the recommendations of the Wood’s
Despatch, new educational policies were formed.
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RECOMMENDATIONS OF THE WOOD’S
DESPATCH |
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Wood’s Despatch is a long document of 100 paragraphs and
deals with the various aspects of great educational importance. Now we will
discuss the recommendations in one by one.
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Aims and Objectives of Educational Policy:
The Despatch first throws light on the aims and objectives of
educational policy of the Company in India. It gave highest priority to the
responsibility of Indian Education overall other responsibilities of the
Company. The Despatch had the following objectives in view:
a) To impart
Western knowledge, information about the western culture to the Indians.
b)
To educate the natives of India so that a class of public servants could be
created.
c) To promote intellectual development and also raise the moral
character of the young generation.
d) To develop practical and vocational
skills of the Indians people so that more and more articles could be produced
and also to create a good market for consumption of those goods.
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Department of Education: The Wood’s
Despatch, for the first time, recommended the creation of a Department of Public
Instruction in each of the five provinces of Bengal, Bombay, Madras, the Punjab
and the North Western provinces. The head of the Department would be called the
Director and he was to be assisted by a number of inspectors. The D.P.T. had to
submit an annual report to the government about the educational progress in his
province.
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Expansion of Mass Education: - Another major
recommendation of the Despatch was expansion of mass education. It was observed
that the common people were deprived of educational opportunities and therefore
much emphasis was given on the increase of setting up primary, middle and high
schools. The Dowaward Feltration Theory as proposed earlier was discarded and in
its place importance to primary education was given. Elementary education was
considered to be the foundation of the education system.
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Establishment of Universities: - The
Despatch recommended the establishment of universities in the three Presidency
towns of Calcutta, Bombay and Madras. The universities were to be modeled after
the London University and these were to have a senate comprising of a
Chancellor, a Vice-Chancellor, and fellows who were nominated by the Government.
The Universities would confer degrees to the successful candidates after passing
the examinations, (of Science or Arts Streams) conducted by the Senate. The
universities were to organize departments not only of English but also of
Arabic, Sanskrit and Persian, as well as law and civil
engineering.
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Grant - in-aid system: - The Wood’s Despatch
recommended the sanction of a grant-in-aid system in the Indian educational
system. To educate the large number of people of India was a difficult task and
so the grant-in-aid system was adopted by the government. Grants were given to
those schools and colleges which satisfied the conditions given below
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a) The schools must provide secular education.
b) The school
management should run the school well.
c) The school should agree to state
inspection from time to time.
d) The schools should follow any rule
prescribed by the government for the regulation of the grant.
e) The school
must charge fees from the students.
Grants were given to the schools for
increasing the salaries teachers, construction of school buildings, granting
scholarships to students, improving conditions of literaries, opening of science
department etc.
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Teaching of Language: - The Wood’s Despatch
gave importance to teaching of English, but at the same time, it also stressed
on the teaching of Indian languages. The Despatch realised that any acquaintance
of European knowledge could be communicated to the common people and that could
be conveyed to them only through learning their own mother tongue. Therefore the
Despatch clearly stated that Indian languages as well as English should be used
as media of instruction.
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Education of Women: - The Despatch
recommended that the government should always support education for women. The
wood’s Despatch stated, “The importance of female education in India cannot be
over rated; and we have observed with pleasure the evidence which is now
afforded of an increased desire on the part of many of the natives of India to
give a good education to their daughters. By this means a far greater
proportional impulse is imparted to the educational and moral tone of the people
than by the education of men”. The Despatch also encouraged the private
enterprises to promote women education.The schools for girls were to be included
among those to which grants-in-aid would be given.
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Training of Teachers: - The Wood’s Despatch
recommended the establishment of teacher training schools in each of the
provinces. There should be training schools for teachers of engineering,
medicine and law. The qualified teachers should be given better pay scales. The
Despatch further emphasized on the provision of scholarships to the teachers
during their training period.
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Professional Education: - The Wood’s
Despatch encouraged professional education. It recommended the establishment of
medical, engineering law and other institutes of professional education. The
Despatch stated that in order to develop vocational efficiency of people and
also to make people realise that the British rule was progressive. Another
reason for the encouragement of vocational education was to control the problem
of unemployment.
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Introduction of network of Graded Schools all over
India: - The Wood’s Despath recommended the establishment of a network
of graded schools all over the country. At one end were the universities and the
colleges, then the high schools followed by the middle schools and the bottom of
the middle schools and at the bottom of the network were the primary schools,
both government and indigenous. Both the Anglo-vernacular and vernacular schools
were to be included in the same class. This system was recommended in order to
enable an individual to receive higher education after completing the different
levels of schools education.
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EVALUATION OF WOOD’S DESPATCH
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| Now we are familiar with the
recommendations of the Despatch of 1854. We have observed that the Despatch
includes a number of valuable and fundamental recommendations for future
educational development in India. It gave new direction to education and laid
the foundation of the present Indian educational system. It solved many
oldeducational issues like gradation of education, medium of instruction and
proposed new schemes for future educational development in India with far
reaching consequences. However, it can not be said that it is free from defects.
Below we shall be understanding its merits and
demerits: |
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Merits of Wood’s Despatch |
The merits of the Despatch are discussed in the
following points:
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The Wood Despatch started a new era in
Indian education system by clearly defining objectives of education. |
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It made the Government realise the importance of
education for the people. |
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It presented a comprehensive scheme of education
embracing primary, secondary and higher education. |
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It recommended the creation of a separate Department
of Public Instruction in five provinces and appointment of a Director to head
the Department. |
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The principle of Downward Filtration Theory was
discarded by the Wood’s Despatch and it encouraged the promotion of mass
education; it recommended the establishment of indigenous schools. |
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By the grant-in-aid system many schools were benefited
and the quality of education improved and private organisations were encouraged
to open new schools. |
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The Despatch encouraged higher education by
recommending the establishment of universities in Calcutta, Bombay and
Madras. |
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The Wood’s Despatch emphasized on the necessity of
vocational education. |
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The Despatch recommended the importance of
establishing teacher training institutes to improve the quality of teachers and
also improves their conditions and salaries. |
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The Despatch recommended scholarships for the poor and
deserving students. |
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Language teaching was encouraged by the Despatch; as a
result, regional languages and classical languages were taught in the
schools. |
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Demerits of Wood’s Despatch |
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The demerits of the Wood’s Despacth are given
below:
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The Despatch, in reality promoted Western literature and
knowledge and government offices showed preferences for persons educated in
English.
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The education planning and management schemes remained only
in black and white.
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It neglected general education. Only the privileged class
receives education. Indigenous schools remained neglected. Priority was given to
people educated on English pattern with regard to government posts. M. R.
Paranjpe stated that, “the authors did not aim at education for leadership,
education for the industrial regeneration of India, education for the defence of
the motherland, in short, education required by the people of a self- governing
nation.
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Departments of Education were opened in the five provinces
but they could not promote the real interest of education.
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The system of grant-in-aid did not operate in proper sense,
i.e., there was always the paucity of funds, the irregularity of their release
and bliased attitude towards the privately managed schools.
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The idea of providing vocational education as advocated by
the Despatch, was in reality absent. People were facing the problem of
unemployment and this is persisting even today.
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The Wood’s Despatch had a partial attitude towards the
Christian missionaries; Christian religious books were easily made available to
the students, in the libraries.
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The three universities were modelled on the London University
and the Government’s policy of nominating members to the senate was biased.
Therefore higher education was not related to Indian conditions.
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The Despatch succeeded in only producing a class of clerks
and accountants.
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The Wood’s Despatch could not remove the imbalance in Indian
education system. The rich people sent their children to English medium schools,
and the government gradually stopped financial aid to the indigenous schools and
so the existence of these schools became jeopardised. It failed to develop
character initiative and leadership among
students.
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In conclusion it has been observed that however, it must
be noted that inspite of all the limitations, the Wood’s Despatch was recognized
as the Magna Carta of Indian Education.’ The objective of the Despatch was very
sincere but the government could not implement the various suggestions and
recommendations. The Department of Education was created in the five provinces
with a DPI, inspectors and other officers. In 1857 three universities were also
established in Calcutta, Bombay and Madras. The main provisions of the document
were of great historical importantance. It provided a boost to secondary
education and to some extent to primary education also. It was however observed
that some of the most important recommendations of the Despatch were not carried
out for a long time and some were given effect in a distorted form. During the
first thirty years after the Despatch, government institutions gradually
increased and beside the Christian Missionaries other private enterprise were
not encouraged.
As education spread and new ideals of social service
emerged, Indian private enterprise began and multiplied but the government was
not prepared to hand over its schools and colleges to Indian management as it
had little faith on the Indians’ capacity and managerial skills. Plans to spread
mass education were not realized nor were vernacular high schools established.
It was painful to observe that the Despatch, to an extent, thought of India as a
supplier of raw materials for British industries and the consumer of the
finished products of England. Indians never recognized the Wood’s Despatch as a
‘Magna Carta’ as it did not sincerely promote universal literacy. The promoters
of the Despatch could not visualize the progress of Indian aspirations even
after a century. The Sepoy Mutiny happened in 1857 and soon after, the East
India Company was disolved and the government came directly under the British
Crown. As a consequence, efforts were made to consolidate the empire and
education was somewhat neglected.
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