16. In 1823, a General Committee of Public Instruction was set up at Calcutta to carry out the proposals embodied in the Charter Act of 1813. In spite of the new ideal of Indian education, which was sponsored by Grant and which was becoming popular day by day, the Committee showed, in its initial stages, its preference for Oriental studies. This started the famous controversy between the Orientalists and the Anglicists. Besides the many British people of the early 19th century, who, in their self-complacency, believed that their language, literature and culture were distinctly superior to those of the Indians and so must be imposed upon the Indian natives in their own interest, there was growing in India a section of newly educated persons who also sincerely believed in the necessity for Indians of modern studies through English. The reason for this attitude of theirs is not far to seek. They had seen how the indigenous schools of higher learning, namely, the Pathasalas, were unable to come up to the requirements of a new age ; on the other hand, English, as a language of the rulers. attracted great attention and its study opened up new avenues of gaining positions of respect and more lucrative employment under the Government. The Orientalists, on their part, were not opposed to the knowledge of the English language and the Western Sciences; they only wanted that this knowledge should proceed from and be based on Oriental learning. In other words, they favoured engrafting of European knowledge on Oriental learning. The views of the European and Indian Anglicists eventually prevailed and soon took a concrete shape when, in 1817, the Hindu College of Calcutta came into existence. It was meant to teach Hindu boys primarily English language and some modern subjects, though Sanskrit also was introduced in its curriculum in 1826.

17. But the Committee of Public Instruction did not pay any heed to the agitation of the Anglicists. On the contrary, it went ahead with its plan to found a Sanskrit College at Calcutta. This led Ram Mohan Roy to lodge a strong protest against this move of the Com- mittee. However, despite his protest, the Calcutta Sanskrit College was duly established in 1824 during the administration of Lord Amherst, as a Tol with 55 stipendiary students and 8 professors who

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taught Nyaya, Smriti, Darsana, Vyakarana, Jyotisa and Ayurveda. In 1828, classes for teaching English were added to' the College, but they were discontinued in 1835 and again re-opened in 1844. In 1851, Pandit Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar, who was then the Principal, substituted the modern methods of teaching Sanskrit for-the traditional method usually practised in Tols. During his term of office and that of his successor, E. B. Cowell, the Sanskrit College came to be transformed into a modern educational institution with a School and a College Department, both of which were affiliated to the Calcutta University. Attempts were, however, made, through its Tol Department, to preserve its character as a centre for intensive study of Sanskrit. To these three departments-Anglo-Sanskrit Collegiate School, Anglo-Sanskrit College and Oriental or Tol Department-a Post- Graduate and Research Department was added in 1951.

18. After the Calcutta Sanskrit College, two more Oriental Colleges were established-one at Delhi in 1825 and the other at Agra in 1827. The main subjects taught in these Colleges were Sanskrit, Arabic and Persian. English classes also were introduced, in course of time, but only as appendages and not as organic parts of the colleges.

19. The many-sided importance of Sanskrit was also appreciated by a number of responsible Englishmen and other Europeans in India. Already the Despatch of 1814 had emphasised that there were "in the Sanskrit language many excellent systems of ethics, with codes of laws and compendiums of duties"; and the Court of Directors had, therefore, decided that due encouragement should be given to the study of Sanskrit. In his report on the Sanskrit College, Calcutta, A. Frazer said (31st January, 1835): "The acquisition of Sanskrit is indispensable not only for the study of the classical books composed in that language, but principally as the mother-language of a great number of Indian dialects.... It is true and obvious that a true and radical reform of a nation in learning and morality (which is the object of a good Government) will begin and proceed with the improvement of their own national language. In this respect the study of Sanskrit cannot be sufficiently encouraged. .." Captain Candy, Superintendent, observed in his report on the Poona Sanskrit College (1840): "Sanskrit I conceive to be the grand reservoir from which strength and beauty may be drawn for the vernacular languages... I look on every native who possesses a good knowledge of his own mother- tongue, of Sanskrit and of English, to possess the power of rendering incalculable benefit to his countrymen."

20. The first few years of the Committee of Public Instruction presented an ironical spectacle. While leading Indians were agitating for instruction in European literature and science and were protesting against the continuance of the prevailing Orientalism, a body of English gentlemen was found to insist upon the retention of Oriental learning to the practical exclusion of European learning. The Committee had already established a press at Calcutta, and, by 1830, fifteen Sanskrit books had been published. In 1830, the press undertook to publish the Mahabharata, but could not complete that work owing to subsequent changes in the educational policy of the Government.

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21. But the influence of the Orientalists soon waned and the popularity of English education grew fast, culminating in the tirade of Trevelyan against Sanskrit literature and Macaulay's Minute of 1835, which sought to produce " a class of persons, Indian in blood and colour, but English in taste, in opinions, in morals and in intellect".Among Macaulay's recommendations were the immediate stopping of the printing of Arabic and Sanskrit books, abolition of the Madrasah and the Sanskrit College at Calcutta and larger encouragement to the Hindu College at Banaras.*

22. Lord Bentinck, the Governor-General, endorsed Macaulay's views, and in his Resolution of 1835, decided that "the great object of the British Government ought to be the promotion of European literature and science among the natives of India; and that all the funds appropriated for the purpose of education would be best employed on English education alone". He, however, promised that the existing institutions of Oriental learning would not be abolished as long as pupils studied there and that the stipends then given to teachers and pupils would not be stopped, though "no new stipends shall be given.... hereafter". He further directed that "no portion of the funds shall hereafter be employed on the printing of Oriental works".

23. It should be further noted in this connection that the Government resolution of 1844 declared English education in terms of bread and butter by directing for the first time that for public employment preference would be given in every case to those who had been educated on English lines. This completed the victory of the new education.

24. It would seem that the political and social vicissitudes and the economic distress which had come upon the Pandits as a class were not the only reasons for the rapid decline of Sanskrit studies. It was primarily the result of a change of outlook and attitude, fostered sedulously by a distinctly alien and somewhat haphazard State policy of over a century, which was right in insisting upon modem learning, but which was certainly wrong in its comparative apathy towards ancient learning; and there never was any serious attempt to synthesise or correlate the two. Perhaps the facile victory of the Anglicists and Macaulay's complacent scheme of Westernisation, as well as the tremendous impact of new and alien ideas, did at that stage blind the ardent advocates of the new learning to a just appraisement of the virtue or necessity of all that was distinctive in the culture and tradition

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of the East. In an excessive zeal for Western education, it was forgotten that the attitude was severing national education from the roots of national life. No doubt, such a stimulus as was furnished by Western education was needed at the moment, and it was right that such a stimulus was eagerly sought and obtained. It would not be just to deny that Western education had been productive of immense benefit, without it we would have- been out of date in an advancing world. But in the educational policy, which was hastily enunciated in the last century, no attempt was made to adapt the old learning to changing social and political needs, or the new learning to national sentiment and outlook. It was never realised at that period .(nor does it seem to have been realised subsequently) that Oriental learning and culture had their roots in the national consciousness and could not be so summarily dismissed; and that it would not be wise to replace it entirely by Western education, however necessary and useful it might have been.

25. With Wood's Educational Despatch of 1854,*1 and the establishment, in 1857, of the three Universities at Calcutta, Bombay and Madras, there was an improvement in the situation, and there grew an appreciation of the advantage of a study of the classical languages of India. The Despatch pointed out that "an acquaintance with the works contained in them is valuable for historical and antiquarian purposes, and a knowledge of the languages themselves is required in the study of Hindoo and Mahomedan law, and is also of great importance for the critical cultivation and improvement of the vernacular languages of India". But, at the same time, it emphatically declared that the aim of the new educational policy wag the diffusion of European knowledge. Elsewhere, the Despatch suggests the institution in the Universities of Professorships a for, among other subjects, Sanskrit, Arabic and Persian. It says: "A knowledge of the Sanskrit language, the root of the vernaculars of the great part of India, is more especially necessary to those who are engaged in the work of composition in those languages".

26. The attitude of the new Universities was generally favourable to Sanskrit. The Universities of Calcutta and Bombay even made a "Second Language" (which for the majority of students was Sanskrit) a compulsory subject at the Entrance and the Intermediate examinations. Thereby, incidentally, these Universities threw the portals of Sanskrit learning wide open to all pupils. In a sense, these Universities were primarily responsible for popularising the study of Sanskrit.

27. At this stage, a reference may be made, in passing, to a controversy which had been en-aging the attention of educationists for some time, namely, that between the Classicists and the Vernacularists. The following may be mentioned as a typical example in this connection. According to the original regulations of the Bombay University, a modern Indian language could be taken up as a subject from the In

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Marticulation up to the B. A. examination. In 1862, however, Sir Alexander Grant, the then Director of Public Instruction for Bombay, moved a resolution in the Senate (which was later passed by that body) that all modern Indian languages should be removed from all University examinations except the Matriculation (where also their study was optional and not compulsory). It was argued that books available in any modern Indian language were of a very inferior standard, that it was hardly worthwhile to study the old poets in those languages, that it was not the duty of the University to develop modern Indian languages, and that their omission from University courses would allow greater attention being paid to the study of classical languages.1 The Madras University, on the other hand, had allowed the option of a modern Indian language to a classical language from its very inception. A special mention deserves to be made, in this connection, of the Panjab University, which grew in 1882 out of the Oriental College established by the Government in 1869 at Lahore. That University conferred degrees and titles in Oriental Learning on candidates who had successfully completed their courses through the medium, not of English, but of the vernacular.

28. The High Schools and Colleges which were started all over the country to impart modern education did provide for the study of Indian languages, and among these Sanskrit was also taught. While in some regions Sanskrit was compulsorily introduced, in a larger number of places Sanskrit was allowed to be taken as an alternative to the mother-tongue, with the result that this system did give the modern educated Indian some grounding in Sanskrit. This was also the age of the great Orientalists. The vast output of research carried out by them in Sanskrit language and literature created a renaissance of Sanskrit in India itself, where educated Indians came to develop a new awareness and critical appreciation of their literary and cultural heritage. It was not long before the new quickening of the intellectual life of the Indians produced new regenerative movements. A new nationalism was dawning. The limited syllabus of the English school and college had serious gaps, particularly on the artistic, creative and spiritual sides, and to make up for these omissions, national institutions were started by private initiative, by public workers, artists, poets, religious leaders and thinkers.

29. Some of these new movements had a direct or indirect connection with Sanskrit, to the revival of interest in literature and learning of which they gave a fresh impetus. Swami Dayananda Sarasvati (1824-1883) and his Arya Samaj founded in 1875, Mrs. Annie Besant (1847-1933) and her Theosophical Society, Ramakrishna Paramahansa (1836-1886) and his great disciple Swami Vivekananda (1863-1902) and the Vedanta movement, Poet Rabindranath Tagore (1861- 1941) and his Visva-Bharati, Aurobindo Ghose (1872-1950) and his Asrama at Pondicherry-each contributed its share to the cultural revival of the country and the growth of interest in Sanskrit classics with which such reawakening was intimately connected. During the second half of the 19th century,

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literary men, educationists, scholars and students of Indian lore, like Radhakanta Deva, Bankim Chandra Chatterji, Rajendralal Mitra, Romesh Chunder Dutt. Ramkrishna Gopal Bhandarkar, Kashinath Trimbak Telang, Anundoram. Borooah, Bhau Daji, Bhagvanlal Indraji, V. Venkayya, Haraprasad Sastri, Mahatma Hansraj, Swami Sraddhanand and others, brought into the world of the Indian intellectual an intelligent and critical appreciation of Sanskrit literature and its value for Indian studies. Even the political phase which this national awakening took, namely, the freedom movement, was not divorced from, a cultural background; and leaders like Bal Gangadhar Tilak and Madan Mohan Malaviya were zealous Sanskritists and promoters of Sanskrit studies. Perhaps none had contributed more to the popularity and position of pre-eminence enjoyed by the Bhagavad-Gita in modern times than the 'Father of the Nation', Mahatma Gandhi, who declared that, if at least to study the Gita, one should learn Sanskrit.

30. Princely India, during the British period, continued to be like a picturesque replica of traditional Indian life. In the courts of the ruling chiefs, Sanskrit Pandits continued to be honoured in the same old way. Had it not been for the lavish patronage accorded by some of the Maharajas, the traditions of Sanskrit and of Indian music would have met with greater extent of decay. Apart from honouring Sanskrit Pandits and musicians in their Darbars and on occasions of domestic celebrations, and national festivals, the Maharajas did two important pieces of service to Sanskrit studies--one, the organisation into libraries of their Palace collections of Sanskrit manuscripts, and two, the setting up of Sanskrit colleges. Darbhanga, Vizianagaram, Baroda, Nagpur, Jaipur, Indore, Gwalior, Mysore, Travancore, Kapurthala, Patiala, Jammu and Kashmir-to mention only the more prominent States-started their Sanskrit Colleges, which were in course of time duly affiliated to the Universities or Government Associations for Sanskrit Examinations in their respective regions. Inspired by the example of the Princes, the Zamindars and smaller landlords and merchants also founded Sanskrit Colleges. Maths, temples and other religious institutions established similar Colleges; and affluent individuals and public leaders and associations also followed, founding their own Sanskrit Colleges, or, by administrative direction, helping old religious and cultural endowments to start such colleges. In addition to these two agencies, namely, the Government- organised Sanskrit Colleges, such as the Banaras and Calcutta Colleges, and the different Colleges of the princely States and the private and religious agencies, there was also the third channel through which the Sanskrit tradition continued to flow, namely, the one Pandit schools. In fact, this tradition of one-Pandit schools was alive in all regions of India in a greater or lesser degree, according to the past history of each place. The tempo of modernisation had not fully swept away the Pandit of the traditional type and his institutions.

31. The nature of modern education was such that the Sanskrit studies which could be provided for in the English School and College were necessarily limited. On the other hand, the Pathasalas and Tols afforded facilities for a more intensive and concentrated type of

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Sanskrit education. However, even the limited provision for Sanskrit in the English colleges had some salutary effect. After a period of pursuit of Sanskrit in these colleges, Indian scholars, who had developed an interest in Sanskrit and had been closely following the work of the Orientalists of the West, felt the need to take to Sanskrit research. In India itself, there were European Civilians, Professors and Mission aries who took interest in Sanskrit research, in the search for and collection of manuscripts, in editions and translations of Sanskrit texts and in critical and historical surveys of different branches of Sanskrit literature. And invariably they associated Indian scholars and traditional Pandits with their work.

32. Sanskrit does not stand alone; the study of the whole past of the country forms its complete background. During this period, the British Government was pursuaded to take up officially the promotion of Indian Archaeology. Through different papers and appeals by Fergusson and Cunningham, the Court of Directors and then the Government were, during the years 1843-1870, led, step by step, to organise an Archaeological Department to survey ancient Indian monuments, cave-temples, paintings, etc. Soon epigraphical work was also taken up as a result of the personal endeavours of Burgess and Fleet. The Asiatic Society in Calcutta had already published some papers on Indian inscriptions. The Indian Antiquary was founded in 1872 and the Epigraphica Indica of the Government in 1888. Archaeo- logy then developed fast under the Viceroyalty of Lord Curzon (1899- 1907), and archaeological collections and Indian Museums to house them were established in different parts of the country.

33. Attention came to be paid also to the literary treasures preserved in the form of manuscripts in Sanskrit and allied languages from the early decades of the 19th century. Starting with the cataloguing of collections already made (such as the Mackenzie Manuscripts) or of existing collections (Sanskrit College, Banaras ; Board of Examiners, Madras; Fort William, Calcutta), surveys of manuscripts in different parts of the country came to be regularly undertaken from 1868 and 1875 when Pandit Radhakrishna, Kielhorn and Rajendralal Mitra began their tours for search of manuscripts in the North-Western, Western and Eastern regions. Within a couple of decades, an enormous amount of manuscript wealth had been brought to light, providing material for researches by scholars in India and abroad.

34. Following the model of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, two other Research Societies were started, namely, the Bombay Literary Society (1804) and the Madras Literary Society (1834), both of which came to be affiliated to the Royal Asiatic Society, London.

35. With all this growth of interest in research in ancient Indian history and Sanskrit literature, it was no longer possible for the Indian Universities to stand as passive spectators. The Indian Universities, at first functioning primarily as coordinating and examining bodies, had worked successfully in the field of undergraduate education. The next

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stage of their development lay in the organisation of Post-Graduate studies and encouragement of original research. No words of praise are adequate for the initiative taken by the Calcutta University, which, under the leadership of Asutosh Mookerjee, first introduced the Post-Graduate courses in 1914, and for the zest with which it promoted research work in all branches of ancient Indian culture. Other Universities followed suit, with separate research departments, awards of research fellowships and studentships, setting up of manuscript libraries and bringing out editions of Sanskrit works. The last decades of the nineteenth century and the first decades of the present century especially witnessed a remarkable outburst of research in Sanskrit and ancient Indian thought and culture, with the springing up of non-officially organised Research Institutes like the Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute, Poona (1917), and the D. A. V. College Research Department, Lahore (1917), the inauguration of new research periodicals like the Indian Historical Quarterly, Calcutta (1924), the Annals of the Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute, Poona (1919), the Journal of Indian History (1921) and the Journal of Oriental Research, Madras (1927) and the publication of the series of Sanskrit texts, like the Bibliotheca Indica, Calcutta (1849), the Kavyamala, Bombay (1886), the Bombay Government Sanskrit and Prakrit Series (1891), the Bibliotheca. Sanskrita, Mysore (1893), the Trivandrum Sanskrit Series, Trivandrum (1905) and the Gaekwad's Oriental Series, Baroda (1916). Private firms of Sanskrit publishers also began to bring out important series of unpublished Sanskrit texts, for instance, the Chowkhamba Sanskrit Series of Banaras, the Nirnaya Sagara Press of Bombay, the Anandashram Press of Poona, Jibananda Vidyasagar of Calcutta, the Vani Vilas Press of Srirangam, the Sri Venkateswar Press of Bombay and Meherchand Lachmandas and Motilal Banarsidas of Lahore. With the special object of fostering Indian cultural studies, there also arose institutions conducted like private Universities, e.g., Tagore's Santiniketan and the Gurukul of the Arya Samaj; and a regular University in the shape of the Banaras Hindu University was founded with the avowed object of developing Hindu Sastras and Sanskrit studies.

36. A significant landmark in this history of the growth of Indian research activities in the fields of Sanskrit and allied disciplines is the Simla Conference of 1911 in which, at the instance of S. H. Butler, Orientalists from India and abroad met to consider the question of establishing a Central Institute for research in Indian history, archaeology, manuscripts study, etc., in Calcutta, which could attract Indian scholars of both the modern and traditional schools. The Conference also suggested the starting of a school at Poona for training Pandits in methods of research and for helping modem scholars to deepen their learning in the recondite branches. The Simla Conference proved infructuous, but it may be said to have paved the way for the birth in 1919 of the All-India Oriental Conference which has, since its inception, served to bring together the entire world of Oriental scholars in India at a common forum. This has in course of time given birth

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to the Indian Philosophical Congress (1925) and Indian History Congress (1936), besides the Indian Numismatics Congress. Grierson's inauguration of the Linguistic Survey of India (in 1903) and its completion (in 1927) and the founding of the Linguistic Society of India in 1928 in a way complete the picture.

37. All this contributed to the growth of serious study and research work by Indian scholars, which, at least in quantity, outstripped what had been done abroad. But there was yet, considering the amount of material available and the lines of work necessary to be undertaken, vast scope for improvement and further encouragement. There were Universities yet lagging behind in the matter of providing for higher studies in Sanskrit. The new awakening resulted in a revival of interest in the regional languages also. With the advance of education and the rapid rate at which modem knowledge was growing, the curriculum of studies in schools and colleges became overcrowded. Sciences and, more recently, technological courses proved a greater attraction to students, and, in the general fall of interest in humanities, the classical languages were the worst sufferers. Even at the hands of the authorities, pure Sanskrit studies appeared to receive less help than allied fields of study.

38. During this period, the Pathasala and Tol system has also gradually deteriorated. The rise of modern schools and colleges and the growth of an education more related to the contemporary situation and the current venues of employment have had an unfavourable impact on the traditional Pathasala and Tol. The intellectually brighter as well as the financially better placed boys went to English schools and colleges. For the last three generations, sons of eminent Pandits all over the country had been drawn into modern education, so that the traditional type of Sanskrit education experienced a steady decay in both- quantity and quality of the personnel available for its transmission and perpetuation. We cannot, indeed, close our eyes to this serious and pitiful situation, namely, that in modern schools and colleges as well as in traditional Pathasalas and Tols, Sanskrit is undergoing an equally disconcerting deterioration ; and on both fronts, Sanskrit is actually in the midst of a crisis.

39. This brief resume of Sanskrit studies would lead us to the main problems now facing Sanskrit education in its two parallel systems. A detailed survey of the present situation of Sanskrit in these two venues of its study will show clearly the contributions and shortcomings of each, the difficulties which Sanskrit study of one type or the other is facing, and the condition in which Sanskrit studies and activities in general are now struggling.

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