A theme repeatedly found among many Anglophiles is that India was totally illiterate and intellectually defunct when the British came to rule us, and that it is they who brought light to India. A slogan repeated often transforms into a “fact” in the unconscious mind of the listeners.
Two statements made by British writers often come to my mind. The first one in effect said/implied that the knowledge/wisdom of the greatest native Indian scholar was not more that that of a tenth standard boy of Europe. The second one in effect said that all the books written by natives at that time would not fill even a single European cupboard.
Interestingly, the very Europeans burned thousands upon thousands of precious handwritten material on one pretext or another. They had a few centuries to do that, and they did their job without going on a holiday. In spite of that, more than one million handwritten manuscripts are said to have survived in India.
The biggest question now is, the Europeans burned, destroyed, and plundered handwritten manuscripts from India for two centuries or more, and in spite of that reportedly more than a million identified manuscripts are left in India. The number of yet to be discovered manuscripts might be ten times that figure. On the other hand, the British have no comparable ancient written wealth to show.
The question now is, did we ever need education from a group of people who did not have anything comparable when Indian sages were authoring multi-volume treatises? The statement that the British gave us education is a modern lie. They probably gave us the Western education, with all its moral ills, but they were not the first to bring education and literacy to India.
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May 18th, 2009 at 5:01 am
[...] The British Gave Us Education ?? [...]
May 18th, 2009 at 7:23 am
I fully agree Shastriji.The statement that the British gave us education is toatally wrong. Most probably they gave us the Western educationfull of moral ills, but they were not at all the first to bring education . Litearature written in holy books as Vedas, Mahabharat,Ramayan and Geeta and soforth are the few examples.To my knowledge the education in India was started in “Gurukuls”
May 18th, 2009 at 7:56 am
I think they just gave us a method of education. A method which has not helped us in developing ingenious thinking in children.
Considering the population, diversity in social/economic status of Indians, what would be a better system of education?
May 18th, 2009 at 2:00 pm
This slogan appeared to be a fact because our treasure of ancient education was merely in manuscripts written in hundreds of regional languages, and not in practice. Most of us specially lesser educated middle class people realize the importance of things only when it is applicable and important in our daily life and relates to our bread and butter. Probably this structured format was initiated by Convent.
Today also, more or less, the same things are continuing because of its appeal and not because of our wish.
May 28th, 2009 at 11:29 am
It makes me feel sick that the British burnt 1000’s of Indian manuscripts.
The British plundered and destroyed most cultures they came in contact with.
June 28th, 2009 at 7:47 pm
मैं इस बात से सहमत हूं। अंग्रेजों के आने के हजारों साल पहले यहां शिक्षा का प्रचार प्रसार था। नलंदा और तक्षशिला जैसे विश्वविद्यालय थे जहां दुनिया के कोने-कोने से लोग पढ़ आते थे। यह शिक्षण की एक सुव्यवस्थित गुरुकुल प्रणाली थी।
एक ही कमी थी, शिक्षा सर्वव्यापी नहीं था, और केवल उच्च वर्णों तक (ब्राह्मण-क्षत्रिय) सीमित था।
पर अंग्रेजी शिक्षा भी कहां जन-जन तक फैली है। हमारे आईआईटी, आईआईएम भी तो उच्च वर्गों (अंग्रेजी पढ़े-लिखे) तक सीमित हैं।
July 31st, 2009 at 12:54 pm
Amen !
We are now educating our own by destroying knowledge in some other form. Western education, has been the root cause of all problems.
Do we have an alternative now. Or they have destroyed all.
RP
December 14th, 2009 at 10:33 pm
Nice article thanks for sharing!
February 15th, 2010 at 3:08 pm
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