Keshub Chunder Sen

“ Unless the women are educated, the education of India will be partial, and at best superficial, for the women of the country conserve all the traditions, all the errors and prejudices, and all the injurious institutions that exist in the country. If you don’t endeavour to give India good mothers, you will not be able to save the rising generations from the evils which have always acted as a curse in India ”

“ The poorest, the most ragged people are still destitute of the blessings of education, even in this enlightened country – England.
How then is it possible for us, how can we for a moment hope, to influence the poor ryots and low-caste people of India by conferring the blessings of education upon the upper classes alone? Some, certainly, will receive by a sort of blessed contagion the spirit and influence of true science and literature, but there will be millions of men that it will be impossible to get at. ”

“ What is to become of the vast masses of the people? – who will have pity and compassion upon them? Are they to remain fettered by ignorance and superstition, and will you continue to give education and enlightenment only to those who boast about riches and wealth, and high status in society? Is there none in England or India who will look compassionately upon these poor people? ”

“ There are thousands of admirers of Shakespeare, and Milton, and Newton, in my country.
The work of education has been carried on to a great extent, and the inevitable result is India has been brought to something like an educational crisis. Have the Government carried out fully the spirit of that famous despatch to which I have referred? Has education spread among all classes of the people, or are the blessings of true knowledge confined only to the upper ten thousand? Those are great questions which demand an answer from all who are interested in the country. ”

“ The views and aspirations of one must be entirely different from the views and aspirations of the other, and how is it possible to realize happy homes while this is the case? And does it not demand your serious consideration – and ought it not to receive from you the best attention it is possible for you to bestow upon the subject – that in educating one section of the community you add to the suffering of the nation? – for education has made the people of India miserable in some measure, by tending to separate the sexes. ”

“ The education that you give to the upper classes will not uproot idolatry and prejudice, for it is amongst the masses that the error and prejudice will always maintain their power, and while you do not uproot those prejudices from the hearts of the masses, a handful of educated Hindus will never be able successfully to reform the country. ”

“ They will then cooperate most harmoniously in all matters calculated not only to purify the household but to purify and regenerate the nation. The husband and wife will sit together, and try to regulate their family, and uproot all those prejudices and iniquitious institutions which have found lodgement within the sacred walls of the family-house for many centuries. In that case they will, with all their enlightenment and reformed ideas, try to bring their influence to bear on the work of purifying all the domestic and social customs and institutions of the country. ”

“ If you desire o make the people loyal, you must educate them. A school or college is a better and stronger safeguard of the power and prosperity of the British nation than a citadel or fortress. If you give the people true education, if you teach them what their duties are, as citizens, to themselves and to the Government, they will certainly be loyal; they will find it to be their duty and their interest to advance the cause of truth and education, to promote their own welfare, and at the same time promote the welfare of those around them. ”

“ There is not room enough in the small houses of India for that huge thing with a huge circumference.
I hope and trust that if you desire at all to enlighten and alleviate the condition of Indian women, you will give them a solid education, not external refinements, not mere outward improvements in dress and diet, but solid education, which enables and purifies the heart. In most cases you must use the vernacular as the medium of instruction, communicating to our women sound ideas of religion, morality, science and literature. ”

“ We cannot any longer deny these poorer classes the light of education. We have too long confined that light to the higher classes, and the time has come for opening our educational establishments, and our institutions and schools, to the poor, as well as to the rich. If this is admitted, as it appears generally to be, a serious responsibility rests on the shoulders of the Government to devise some means for carrying out that great object. I do not speak as statesman or politician; I do not pretend to dive into politics ”

“ By giving education to one sex only, you are creating a broad gulf between it and the opposite sex, for the wives of intelligent young men in India cannot possibly sympathise with them, either in matters of politics, literature, science and religion, or in the great questions that affect their social life and their domestic duties. The husband and the wife cannot possibly sympathize with each other if one is educated and the other not. ”

“ You do not complete their education although you give them loaves and fishes; you give them lucrative appointments, but you do not give them a good sound education in England. There are at this moment a large number of intelligent young men anxious to come to England, and if the British government will only give them the means to carry out their object, they will come here immediately at tremendous risk, at the risk of their lives and health, and will subject themselves to all manner of social obloquy and penalty, even excommunication. ”

“ And if you wish to rescue her from ignorance and to give her all the blessings of true civilization, you must educate her properly. But what is the process by which you propose to enlighten Indian women? There are some not only in India but in England, who think if native women do not wear crinoline, speak French, and play on the piano, they are pat redemption, and that the best way to educate and regenerate them is to make them go through all that process of training which is considered essential to civilised life in England. ”

“ There are at present in India two thousand public schools for the education of girls, and there are fifty thousand pupils who are receiving sympathetic education in these schools. Thus already we are beginning to have a new generation of reformed Indian women.
There are many here who are anxious to understand what is the actual position of women in India. Some exaggerate all that is miserable, all that is sad in the condition of Indian women, while others think too lightly of the matter, and try to make themselves believe that everything is going on well in that direction. ”

“ If it is advisable to give the most distinguished of my fellow-countrymen a sound education, it is desirable they should now and then come to England to study English life, and English literature and science, and it is for that reason, I believe, the noble lord in the chair sanctioned this measure after due deliberation and I am glad to say that it is to him that India owes this precious boon. ”

“ You give our people education in schools and colleges; but our people demand a practical training also, and if you put them in those higher posts of responsibility and emolument, you give them that practical training and discipline which is so essential to integrity, honesty, and probity, and a successful discharge of high duty. ”

“ There is a theory in our country known as the filtration of education. Education is said to filter downwards, and I do believe in my heart that does, and that if you impart education to the higher classes it necessarily and inevitably descends into the lower strata of society. ”

“ Every year Bengal sends up no fewer than 1,000 young men for matriculation, and this is certainly a gratifying fact, showing as it does that the efforts of the Government have been appreciated, and that the nation, has not been slow to understand and to realise the fruits of true education. ”

“ Let me ask you – are not my countrymen fit for these high posts? Let those who have spent time in India bear testimony to the fact, if it is established by experience, that people of India are not unworthy of the high posts which it is impossible for the Government to confer upon them. ”

“ Hence, therefore, the question has been seriously discussed, both by the Government of India and the Indian Council here, whether the time has not come for closing the higher schools and colleges, and diverting the funds which have been appropriated to them to the expansion of education amongst the poor and helpless members of the Indian population.
The landowners constitute a powerful section of the Indian community, and they are always anxious, as all sections are anxious, to see justice done to themselves. ”

“ Women in India have always exercised great influence, if not directly on the destinies of the nation, at least on household affairs, and indirectly on several social matters of great importance and interest. The women of India are certainly powerful, and in many cases we have seen that power has been properly used. ”

“ If the English ladies will only go about visiting their native sisters day after day, they will do a great deal towards exercising a high intellectual and moral influence upon them. It will help them to attain not merely knowledge, but also that discipline of life, that softness of disposition, and that righteousness of outward character and inward life, which are essential to true refinement... ”

“ They are quite as lively as their sisters in England – and as many English husbands oftentimes complain that instead of being able to govern their wives, their wives govern them, so in India there are many husbands who complain similarly that they are governed by their wives. The effects of such government are already apparent. Many would come to England, many would break through caste distinctions, many would stand forward as heroes in matters of social and religious reformation, but they cannot do so simply because they are kept down by their wives. ”

“ I will not say a single word for those who clamour to get high posts, but have not the ability to fill them worthily, but I plead for those of my countrymen, and they may be counted by scores, who are worthy of all the honour that a paternal government can give them. ”

“ It is desirable that you should establish railways and telegraphs, that you should open up works of irrigation, and that you should try in all possible ways to promote the material prosperity of the country. All these certainly are desirable; but, after all, these are only external refinements of civilisation, for unless the heart of the nation is reformed and purified, there cannot be anything like true and lasting reformation. ”

“ And if you educate the people, will you not also encourage them by rewarding them with higher appointments, and throwing open to them posts which are at present exclusively enjoyed by Europeans? You may talk of pursuing truth for truth’s sake, or of acquiring wisdom for wisdom’s sake, but people of the world are not always influenced by these high and transcendental considerations ”

“ There are small schools here and there which are multiplying rapidly in all parts of the country; but it is to these higher educational establishments that the people resort to receive first-class English education. The Government will, therefore, be bound for many years to keep up these high educational institutions, if it is anxious to give the people the highest truths of modern science and the purest principles of English literature. ”

“ If there are dishonest men amongst them, certainly cast them away, let them have no part in the administration of the country, let them not be allowed to make their way into the judicial or executive service; but if there are really educated and learned men, honest and truthful men, it is your duty to give them all possible encouragement by opening to them higher departments of the Government. ”

“ Look at the Indian koolin, with his fifty wives, who never thinks himself responsible to God or man for the maintenance or education of these fifty women. When he dies, they all become widows, and are doomed to perpetual widowhood. There is none to relieve them – it is altogether impossible for Indian society as it is to help them in any way. ”

“ If merit is not recognised, still it is merit, and it ought to be honoured as such; but if it is rewarded, it becomes valuable in the eyes of all, and everybody is encouraged to pursue that course in which merit obtains its due reward. ”