Adam's Reports on Vernacular Education in Bengal and Behar/Report 2/Section 5

SECTION V.

Female Instruction.

Some account of the means and amount of female instruction is indispensable, but on this subject I have been able to collect very little information.

The female population of all ages in Nattore, according to Table I., amounts to 94,717.

Of the total female population, 16,497 are under five years of age; that is, are below the teachable age, or the age at which the first instruction in letters may be or is communicated.

Of the total female population, 16,792 are between fourteen and five years of age; that is, are of the age at which the mind is capable of receiving in an increasing degree the benefit of instruction in letters. The state of instruction amongst this unfortunate class cannot be said to be low, for with a very few individual exceptions there is no instruction at all. Absolute and hopeless ignorance is in general their lot. The notion of providing the means of instruction for female children never enters into the minds of parents; and girls are equally deprived of that imperfect domestic instruction which is sometimes given to boys. A superstitious feeling is alleged to exist in the majority of Hindu families, principally cherished by the women and not discouraged by the men, that a girl taught to write and read will soon after marriage become a widow, an event which is regarded as nearly the worst misfortune that can befal the sex; and the belief is also generally entertained in native society that intrigue is facilitated by a knowledge of letters on the part of females. Under the influence of these fears there is not only nothing done in a native family to promote female instruction, but an anxiety is often evinced to discourage any inclination to acquire the most elementary knowledge, so that when a sister, in the playful innocence of childhood, is observed imitating her brother’s attempts at penmanship, she is expressly forbidden to do so, and her attention drawn to something else. These superstitious and distrustful feelings prevail extensively, although not universally, both amongst those Hindus who are devoted to the pursuits of religion, and those who are engaged in the business of the world. Zemindars are for the most part exempt from them, and they in general instruct their daughters in the elements of knowledge, although it is difficult to obtain from them an admission of the fact. They hope to marry their daughters into families of wealth and property, and they perceive that, without a knowledge of writing and accounts, their daughters will, in the event of widowhood, be incompetent to the management of their deceased husbands’ estates, and will unavoidably become a prey to the interested and unprincipled. The Mahomedans participate in all the prejudices of the Hindus against the instruction of their female offspring, besides that a very large majority of them are in the very lowest grades of poverty, and are thus unable, even if they were willing, to give education to their children. It may, therefore, be affirmed that the juvenile female population of this district, that is, the female population of the teachable age or of the age between fourteen and five years, without any known exception and with so few probable exceptions that they can scarcely be taken into the account, is growing up wholly destitute of the knowledge of reading and writing. Upon the principle assumed in Section I in estimating the total population, it will follow that the juvenile female population of the whole district is eight times that of Nattore or 134,336; that is, in the single district of Rajshahi there is this number of girls of the teachable age growing up in total ignorance.

Of the total female population, 61,428 are of adult age or above fourteen years; and according to the above-mentioned estimate it will follow that the adult female population of the whole district is eight times that of Nattore or 491,424. It would have been more conformable to the customs of the country to have fixed twelve instead of fourteen as the adult age of females, the former being the age at which married girls are usually taken to their husbands’ houses, but the latter was preferred in order to obtain similar data for comparison between the different corresponding divisions of the male and female population. If we take into account the early age at which married females leave the parental roof, it will appear probable that there are in this district alone at least half a million of adult females; and with the views which are generally and justly entertained in European society of the influence exercised by the female sex upon the character of their offspring, it would be an object of importance to ascertain the amount of cultivation possessed by this important class. The total absence of means for their instruction in early life and the strong prejudices directly operating against their instruction, sufficiently prove what the answer to such an enquiry must be. Although my information is necessarily imperfect, nothing that is known leads me to suppose that there are many, if any, exceptions to the general character of extreme ignorance. It has already been stated that zemindars, for the most part, instruct their daughters in the elements of knowledge; and for the reasons there assigned, instances sometimes occur of young Hindu females who have received no instruction under their parents’ roof taking lessons, at the instigation of their parents and brothers, after they have become widows, with a view to the adequate protection of their interests in the families of which they have become members. The number of principal zemindars in the whole district is about fifty or sixty, of whom more than a half are females and widows. Of these, two, viz., Ranees Suryamani and Kamal Mani Dasi are alleged to possess a competent knowledge of Bengali writing and accounts, while some of the rest are more imperfectly instructed and others are wholly ignorant. Other exceptions to the general ignorance are found amongst the mendicant Vaishnavas or followers of Chaitanya, amounting in Nattore probably to fourteen or fifteen hundred individuals, who are generally able to write and read and who are also alleged to instruct their daughters in these accomplishments. They are the only religious body of whom as a sect the practice is characteristic. Yet it is a fact that as a sect they rank precisely the lowest in point of general morality, and especially in respect of the virtue of their women. It would be erroneous, however, to attribute the low state of morality to the degree of instruction prevailing amongst them. It is obviously and solely attributable to the fact that the sect is a colluvies from all other sects—a collection of individuals who throw off the restraints of the stricter forms of Hinduism in the profession of a doctrine which allows greater license. The authors and leaders of this sect had the sagacity to perceive the importance of the vernacular dialect as a means of gaining access to the multitude, and in consequence their works, original and translated, in that dialect, form a larger portion of the current popular literature than those of any other sect. The subject-matter of these works cannot be said to be of a very improving character, but their existence would seem to have established a love of reading in the sect, and the taste has in some measure at least extended to their women. With these exceptions the total number of grown up females in the district may be reckoned as destitute of instruction in letters.