Did
educational reforms have a greater effect on the Indian people than any other
changes introduced by the British between 1773 and 1856? Explain your answer.
British educational reforms played a large role in changing Indian lifestyle. Thomas
Macaulay believed that European ideas of education were vastly superior to
anything coming out of India. As a result, the British imposed a system of
education that promoted western values on a people who resented this
interference. He aimed to educate a group of people or class of Indians who
would take on western values and help the British to govern the millions of
other Indians effectively. Indians had to send their children to co-educational
schools which was hated since it appeared to impose the British system on the
Indians without due regard to their religious and cultural feelings.
However, there were other reforms
too that effected the Indian people. The replacement of Persian and Sanskrit by
English as the official language in the 1830s deeply upset both the Muslims and
Hindus. Although a common language would help to unite India, imposing a
European culture on the Indians would alienate many of them. This had the
potential to threaten their languages. This highly affronted both Muslim and
Hindu communities.
A number of social reforms had
been imposed by the British without consultation or care for local feeling
which caused much unrest. The Indian were forced to abandon purdha which had
been an Indian custom for centuries. In 1795, the banning of female infanticide
was declared to be murder, but the British found difficulty in enforcing this
as it was again a tradition practised in many parts of India. Suttee, the
ritual burning of Indian women on the funeral pyres of their husbands was also
banned by the British, first in Bengal and then in the rest of the country.
In 1852, the ‘Doctrine of Lapse’
was introduced without any consultation. It caused unrest because the lands of
any local kingdom not having a direct male heir were taken over by the British.
The East India Company took over a number of lands; for example, Jhansi in 1853
and Oudh in 1856, using this policy. Similarly, the ‘Agrarian Policy’ was
disliked as well because the land would be confiscated by the British if the landowner
did not have the documents of his land.
Christian Missionaries came to
India to convert the local population as well as to set up schools. In these
schools, the Missionaries taught Christianity and expected locals, who worked
for them, to give up their religion and follow the Christian teachings. This
was resented by Muslims, Hindus and Sikhs alike as they feared the Islam,
Hinduism and Sikhism were under threat from this.
Therefore, a conclusion can be
made that the ‘Doctrine of Lapse’ had the greatest effect on Indian people. It
allowed the British to expand their land and rule over more people;
resultantly, exercising the other policies became easier as well.
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