(ii) The second half of the century: Anglo-Indian
education in decline
(iii) Conclusions .
2. Anglo-Indian Education before 1857: The Community
fights back
In 1792 Charles Grant, an opponent of the Wilberforce
circle, wrote his treatise, "Observations on the state of
society among the Asiatic subjects of Great Britain,
particularly with respect to morals and on the means of
Improving it". Christian Imperialism sought to remedy
Grant's racially discriminatory document. In 1793, the
reformer Wilberforce stated in the House of Commons that it
would be
. . . the peculiar and bounden duty of the
British legislature to promote . . . the
interests and happiness of the inhabitants of
the British Dominions in India. (1)
This approach was rejected and the attempt to insert a
clause into the Company's Charter to support the cause of
missionary education in India suffered a major setback.
Wilberforce saw education as a major instrument in
promoting the development of the individual, and during the
eighteenth century, the educational and evangelisation
process in India was seen both as an end in itself as well
as paralleling educational developments in Britain. (2)
This was because the period 1790-1820 had seen
developments in the education of the poor in England. The
Industrial Revolution had started, and the suffering of the
poor was blamed on lack of education and consequent
character building, rather than on unregulated
capitalistic economic expansion.
The Indians were compared to the poor in England: since
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