Adam's Reports on Vernacular Education in Bengal and Behar/Report 2/Section 6

SECTION VI.

Instruction of the Male Population.

I propose in this place to compare the existing means of instruction with the wants of the juvenile male population, and to estimate the amount of cultivation possessed by the adult male population.

The male population of all ages in Nattore, according to Table I., amounts to 100,579.

Of this population, 18,442 are under five years of age, that is, have not yet attained the age at which the first instruction in letters is or may be communicated.

Of the male population, 23,637 are between fourteen and five years of age, that is, of the teachable or school-going age. In estimating the means of instruction for this population, we may put schools of learning amongst the Hindus entirely out of the question, for although the teachers of those institutions receive pupils before they are fourteen, yet I found scarcely any instance of a student below that age and a large majority of them are full-grown men. It will, therefore, be correct to class the students at schools of Hindu learning generally, and convenient to class them universally, as of adult age. On the other hand, a very few instances may be found of youths above fourteen attending the schools of elementary instruction, and these on the same general principle will be classed as of the school-going age, although actually beyond it. We have already seen that, in the elementary schools of all descriptions, both amongst Hindus and Mahomedans, the total number of scholars is 263; and it has also appeared that in 1,588 families there are about 2,383 children who receive domestic instruction, the total number who receive any sort of instruction thus amounting to 3,644. Deduct this number from the number of male children between fourteen and five, and it thus appears that of 32,637 children of an age capable of receiving instruction, 19,993 are wholly uninstructed. Of the whole male population of the teachable age, the proportion of the instructed to the uninstructed is thus as 133 to 1,000. In other words, for every number of children amounting to 133 who receive some sort of instruction either at home or at school, there are 1,000 who receive no instruction whatever.

This, although a very decisive fact, does not alone present a complete view of the inadequacy of the means of instruction. The large numerical proportion of those needing instruction to those receiving it, shows that the means of instruction must be exceedingly scanty; but this conclusion is still more fully established when it is added that the means of instruction actually provided are not only insufficient numerically for the juvenile population to be instructed, but that compared with similar institutions in other countries they afford only the lowest grades of instruction, and those in imperfect forms and in the most desultory manner. What, for instance, bearing the semblance of instruction, can be less worthy of the name than the mere knowledge of the forms and sounds of letters to which instruction in the Arabic elementary schools is limited? And in the Bengali and Persian schools, which are several grades higher, I have shown how imperfect is the instruction communicated. Even that proportion, therefore, of the juvenile population who are receiving some sort of elementary instruction must be regarded as most defectively instructed.

Another element in estimating the adequacy of the means of instruction to the wants of a given population is the fit distribution of those means; but where the means are so scanty in amount and so imperfect in their nature, it may appear of little consequence how they are distributed. In point of fact the police sub-division of Nattore is a favorable specimen of the whole district, for it appears to be decidedly in advance of all the other thanas. According to the best information I can collect, Hariyal, Chaugaon, Puthiya, Bhawanigunge, Bilmariya, and Bauleah rank next to Nattore; while Tannore, Manda, Dubalhati, Godagari, Sarda, and Mirgunge are almost entire blanks as to the means of education. If, however, we give the other thanas the advantage, with respect to the means and amount of instruction, of being on an equality with Nattore, and if we assume that the juvenile male population bears the same proportion to the adult male population throughout the district as it does in Nattore, then in the mode before adopted of estimating the total population, eight-times the juvenile population of Nattore will represent the total juvenile population of the district; and it will thus appear that of 181,096 children between fourteen and five throughout the district, 21,152 are receiving some sort of instruction, however imperfect, either at home or at school, and 159,944 are wholly destitute of the means or opportunity of acquiring the simplest elements of education. My own observations and the inquiries I have made of others lead me to believe that this is a more favorable representation of the amount of elementary instruction in the district than strict fact would justify; and yet what a mass of ignorance it exhibits within a comparatively small space, growing up to occupy the place of the ignorance that has gone before it, and destined, it may be feared, to re-produce and perpetuate its own likeness.

The amount of cultivation possessed by the adult male population may be estimated from several details contained in Table I.

The male adult population of Nattore, including all of the male sex who are above fourteen years, that is, who have passed beyond the school-going age, amounts to 59,500; and in this population there are different classes of individuals who have received a greater or less amount of instruction. The first class consists of teachers of schools of learning who we have seen are 39 in number. The extent of their attainments is shown in the account given in Table III. of the institutions which they conduct. In respect of wealth and property they have a comparatively humble place in native society; but in respect of intellectual cultivation and acquired learning, religious authority and moral influence, they hold the first rank. The second class consists of those who have received either a complete or an imperfect learned education, but who have not the means or the ability to establish or conduct a school of learning. They support themselves in general as initiating or family priests; as reciters or interpreters of the puranas, on the occasion of public celebrations by rich families; as the performers of propitiatory rites for averting ill or obtaining good; and as mendicant visitors at the houses of the great. The number of such persons in Nattore is eighty- seven, all Hindus, to whom as belonging to the same general class must be added a learned Musalman, making in all 88. The third class consists of the students at Hindu schools of learning, in number amounting to 397, to whom as already stated I shall rank without exception as adults, although there may be a very few amongst them who are under fourteen years of age. At present their attainments in Hindu learning are in many instances respectable, and they are growing up to occupy the places of the two preceding classes. The fourth class consists of those without being, or claiming to be, learned in the technical sense of the term, have acquired a degree of knowledge superior to mere reading and writing, such as a knowledge of Bengali accounts, sometimes an acquaintance with Persian as a written language, often an acquaintance with Hindustani as a spoken language, and in three or four instances a smattering of English. They are for the most part persons having some landed property, retainers of wealthy families, officers of Government, servants of merchants and planters, money-lenders and their agents, shop-keepers, teachers of Persian and Bengali schools, &c. Their number in 3,255. The fifth class consists of those who can either sign their names or read imperfectly, or perhaps can do both, but the power to do either has obtained admission into this class. It is proper to note this distinction, because the power of reading and writing is in general acquired at school at the same time; but sometimes a person has had only a few months’ or perhaps weeks’ instruction at school and is just able to sign his name without pretending to read any other writing; and in other cases persons have by self-instruction at home acquired the power to sign their names without making any further advances. On the other hand, some can read without being able to write or pretending to understand even what they read. This class, therefore, includes all who have made any attainment whatever, however humble, in reading or writing, and the individuals composing it consist of the lowest description of Musalman priests, some of whom teach the formal reading of the Koran; the lowest descriptions of dealers or mechanics such as oilmen, flowermen, smiths, manufacturers of earthen-ware, &c.; and the lowest descriptions of brahmans who employ themselves in fomenting disputes in villages about caste and making the conciliation of parties a source of gain to themselves, or who act as cooks, messengers, attendants on idols for hire, &c., &c. The persons of this class are 2,342 in number. These five classes, embracing as far as I can ascertain the entire literary attainments of Nattore, both real and nominal, contain in all 6,121 individuals, leaving, out of the male adult population (59,500), not less than 53,379 who have received not even a single ray of knowledge into their minds through the medium of letters and who will probably remain equally ignorant throughout life. Assuming the former estimate of the entire population of the district, and giving all the other police sub-divisions the advantage of supposing that each has an equal amount of literary cultivation to that of Nattore, it will follow that the total male adult population of Rajshahi is 476,000, of whom 48,968 know more or less of letters, leaving 427,032 who are totally destitute of the advantages of education in its very humblest forms. Of the whole adult male population the proportion of the instructed to the uninstructed is thus as 114·6 to 1,000. In other words, for every number of adult males amounting to 114 or 115 who have acquired some knowledge of letters, however superficial and imperfect, there are 1,000 who have grown up and who must remain totally ignorant of all that a knowledge of letters alone can impart.

The conclusions to which I have come on the state of ignorance both of the male and female, the adult and the juvenile, population of this district require only to be distinctly apprehended in order to impress the mind with their importance. No declamation is required for that purpose. I cannot, however, expect that the reading of this report should convey the impressions which I have received from daily witnessing the mere animal-life to which Ignorance consigns its victims, unconscious of any wants or enjoyments beyond those which they participate with the beasts of the field—unconscious of any of the higher purposes for which existence has been bestowed, soceity has been constituted, and government is exercised. I am not acquainted with any facts which permit me to suppose that, in any other country subject to an enlightened Government and brought into direct and constant contact with European civilization, in an equal population there is an equal amount of ignorance with that which has been shown to exist in this district. Would that these humble representations may lead the Government of this country to consider and adopt some measures with a view to improve and elevate the condition of the lower classes of the people, and to qualify them both adequately to appreciate the rights and discharge the obligations of British subjects. In such a state of ignorance as I have found to exist, rights and obligations are almost wholly unknown, and Society and Government are destitute of the foundations on which alone they can safely and permanently rest.