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Indian Freedom Struggle (1707–1947 A.D.)

Notes reform and the only remedy for social abuses was education. The ‘Macaulayian System’ of education
has profoundly affected the moral and intellectual character of the people of India.
Bentinck’s Government defined the aim of education in India and the medium of instruction to be
employed. How were the govenment grants for education to be spent? Were government subsidies
to be spent for the encouragement of Oriental languages and Indian literature or for instruction of
Indians Western sciences and literature and through the medium of English? The members of the
committee of Public Instruction were divided into two groups of equal strength: the Orientalists led
by Hayman Wilson and Princep Brothers and the Occidentalists or Anglicists led by Sir Chrles
trevelyan and supported by Indian liberals like Raja Rammohan Roy. Bentinck appointed Macaulay
as the President of the Committee. Macaulay gave a definite turn to the controversy. He set forth his
yiews in the famous minute dated 2 February 1835 in which he ridiculed Indian literature. Were
public funds to be spent, wrote Macaulay, to teach ‘medical doctrines which would disgrace an English
farrier, astronomy which would move laughter in girls at an English Boarding school, history
abounding with kings thirty feet high and reigns 30,000 years long, geography made up of seas of
treacle and seas of butter. Are we to teach false history, false astronomy, false medicine, because we
find them in company with a false religion.” He, contended that the vernacular languages contained
neither literary value nor scientific information and that “a single shelf of a good European library
was worth the whole native literature of India and Arabia.” He further wrote, “What the Greek and
Latin were to the contemporaries of More and Ascham our tongue is to the people of India.” In
making his recommendations Macaulay had planned to produce a class of persons who would be
“Indian in blood, and colour, but English in taste, in opinions, in morals and intellect” and expressed
the hope in one of the letters to his father that “if our plans of education are followed up, there will
not be a single idolater among the respectable classes in Bengal 30 years hence.”
Macaulay’s views were accepted and embodied in a Resolution of March 7, 1835, which decreed that
English would be the official language of India in the higher branches of adrmnistration.
Since then English language, English literature, English political literature and English natural sciences
have formed the basis of higher education in India.

5.3 Financial Reforms

The heavy drain of Burmese War had depleted the treasury of the Company. In 1828 public expenditure
far exceeded the revenue. In the words of Charles Metcalfe, “The Government which allows this to
go on in time of peace deserves any punishment.” With an eye on the Charter debates, the Home
authorities had enjoined on Bentinck the policy of peace and economies in public expenditure.
Bentinck appointed two committees, one military and one civil, to make recommendations for effecting
economy in expenditure. Under special instructions from the Court of Directors, Bentinck reduced
the bhatta, i.e. extra or additional allowance paid to military officer. The new rules decreed that in
case of troops stationed within 400 miles of Calcutta one-half bhatta would be allowed. Thus, a saving
of £ 20,000 a year was effected. The allowances of civil servants were also reduced.
The Government adopted better measures for the collection of land revenue in Bengal. The land
revenue settlement of the North Western Provinces (modern U.P.) carried on under the supervision
of Robert Merttins Bird yielded better revenues. Expenditure on the costly settlements in the Straits
of malacca was reduced. Further, Bentinck employed Indians wherever possible in place of high-
paid Europeans.
Opium trade was regularised and licensed. In future opium could be exported only through the port
of Bombay, which gave the Company a share in the profits in the shape of duties.
The net result of these economies was that the deflicit of one crore per year that Bentinck inferited
was converted into a surplus of 2 crores per year by 1835. He had also stimulated the economy by
encouraging iron and coal production, tea and coffee plantations and irrigation schemes.

62 LOVELY PROFESSIONAL UNIVERSITY