Gurukulas: A Functioning Indigenous Education System in Early 19th Century

Authored by Punit

Indian knowledge traditions are among the oldest knowledge system to have existed; its domains transcend the narrow disciplinary boundaries of today. These knowledge traditions have been maintained over generations through the institutions namely ‘Gurukula’ which can be understood as residential schools. Apart from Gurukula, there were large universities like Vikramshila and Nalanda. These institutions were spread across the geographical territory of the Indian subcontinent. Scholars such as A.S. Altekar, N.N Mazumdar and more recently Suhana Singh have explained the nuances of these institutions and the mechanism through which they imparted knowledge across varied section of the populace.

However, foreign invasions in the early medieval to medieval period led to large scale disruption in proper functioning of such institutions, particularly that of universities. The destruction of various universities such as Nalanda and Vikramsila by Islamic invaders is well known. But the Gurukuls which were comparatively smaller in size and were more evenly distributed, even across the rural areas, survived these attacks. The accounts of various foreign travellers coming to India throughout the medieval period, speaks of its prevalence. And they continued to the early colonial period which can be seen from Adam’, which highlights the presence of Gurukulas across Bihar and Bengal.

Travenier, a 17th century French gem merchant, in his travelogue Travels in India (2020) gives detailed description of education and transmission of knowledge in Gurukukls. He praises Brahmans for their knowledge in astronomy as “they do not make a mistake of a minute” in foretelling the eclipse of the sun and moon. He elaborated on a kind of school at Benaras, where people used to study astrology and law. Travenier also gives unique description of a building established by Mirza Raja Jai Singh, where the education was imparted to children of princes taking inspiration from the gurukul tradition. Here the students were taught to read and write Sanskrit, mathematics and some knowledge of geography as well. Similarly the French physician Bernier in his book Travels In the Mogul Empire speaks about the system of education in tune with “schools of the ancient”.

In Bengal District Gazetter, it has been mentioned by L. S. S. O Malley that in Bengal during the Mughal period, the rent leisured class gave patronage to the classical Sanskrit learning. People such as Ran Bhavani and Raja Krishna Chandra made large number of land endowments to Gurukulas. Furthermore Henry Lawrence, a British military officer suggested in his report that there was one school for every 1783 inhabitants of the most backward division of the Punjab at the time of annexation. Even writing as late as 1820, Abbe J.A. Dubois says that "there are very few villages in which one or many public schools are not to be found ... that the students learn in them all that is necessary to their ranks and wants ... namely, reading, writing, and accounts”. Hence, it can be seen that the intricate systems of Gurukuls survived the disruption caused centuries of Islamic political hegemony.

The real blow to the Gurukul education came with the onset of British Colonialism and the consequent interventions it initiated across the socio-cultural and political domains. On the one hand these European colonial officers and also missionaries rediscovered various texts and knowledge traditions of India, but they in a way systematically destroyed the system of Gurukuls.

After Macaulay Minute, which settled the ongoing debate of medium of instruction for the natives in favour of Anglicist, the limited government resource was to be devoted solely for the teaching of western sciences and literature in English. The Governors of the North Western Provinces such as Clerk and James Thomason, and Governor-Generals of India like Auckland, Ellenborough and others closed down these schools as they consisted of “boys from miserable background” and “lower classes” as they thought students from lower origins were not qualified for modern education. They enforced their system of elementary education from above which was controlled by administrative machinery, something which was alien to the people. Hence, the local support withered leading to the further depletion of funds which were already scarce for these Gurukuls. These gurukuls were mostly supported by rent-free land which was withheld. Dharmpal in his work A Beautiful Tree (2021) states that it was sometimes as large as 35 percentage of the total land, and sometimes even 50 percent was seized by the administration in name of land reforms. G.W. Leitner, the founder of Government College, Lahore, and the Punjab University and undoubtedly one of the world's greatest ever linguist, who studied 'Indigenous Education in the Punjab, gives the names of many of hundreds of scholars who were endowed with lands but whose grants were terminated as a result of which the institution they ran died down within a generation.

With the increasing dominance of British Colonial regime, the Indian education system which used to provide education to masses was replaced by a mechanism which was made to serve the elites. Along with choosing limited number of students they also wanted to limit the education given. As Pramila V Rao shows in her article that Anglicist–Orientalist debate was not just the difference in perspective on “what” to teach to Indians but was also closely related to “whom” to teach and “how much” to teach. The result was the increasing illiteracy as Henry Lawrence who was a British Military officer and a surveyor shows that there was one school for every 1783 inhabitant of the most backward division of Punjab at the time of annexation. But 30 years later in 1881, according to the president Of Education Commission Sir William Wilson Hunter “there is one school of whatever sort to every 9.028 inhabitants”.

Finally, looking at the evolution of the education system in India, we can conclude that the gurukul system, which served the Indian way of life better, was educating the masses throughout the medieval period, but only in the 19th century it faced setbacks.

References

1. Tavernier, J. B. (2020). Travels in India. Gyan Publishing House

2. Dharampal (2021). A Beautiful Tree. Rasthtrotthana Sahitya.