MAHATMA GANDHI’S EDUCATION POLICY IN PRE AND POST COLONIAL INDIA

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MAHATMA GANDHI’S EDUCATION POLICY IN PRE AND POST COLONIAL INDIA

Journal Title: Освітній дискурс : збірник наукових праць - Year 2018, Vol 4, Issue 4

Abstract

Urgency of the research. Education must aim at the integral development of personality and that we need to have complete education for the complete human being. The concept of the integral development of personality demands for the harmonization of the rational, ethical, aesthetic and spiritual. The personality develops best when the educational atmosphere provides to every children a good deal of freedom; freedom in pursuing inner inclinations, freedom in regulating pace of progress, and freedom in determining directions of education. Therefore the education should be child centre which will put the child in the centre of the classroom but also in the centre of the society itself. This paper tries to focus on the challenges present in front of India in the area of education system in pre and post Colonial period because right from the beginning of their relationship with India, the British, who had come as traders and had become rulers and administrators, had influenced the economic, political and educational systems of the country. Their impact on the cultural and social life of India was gradual. It is essential to review the educational policies under the British rule to understand the present and visualize the future. In the light of the very backdrop of the history of the development of free and compulsory education in India need to analyse pre- independence and post-independence policy of the education for the harmonization of education for making a complete human being because 21st century key challenges in front of youth are in search of meaningful career, in search of affordable manpower and flexible framework for it and universities are beset with one thought that degrees should be relevant and able to solve the real problems of the society. Target setting. Development of education system during the British period was determined by the needs of the colonial powers. If we analyse the development, we will find that the colonial interests of the British always shaped the then educational policies of India. As it is rightly said by Swami Vivekananda education system in India is "a clerk-making machine" because it is drafted as per the requirement of Britishers under the guidance of Lord Macaulay. This system of education was established in India at the cost of the traditional indigenous education system which was imposed on Indians forcefully. Before, this unfamiliar pedagogy of education in India both the Hindus and the Muslims had their own systems of education. Both the systems went into oblivion gradually and suffered a setback because of political turmoil and lack of a strong centralised political authority and want of suitable patronage (Purkait, 1992, p.1). It tried to eradicate social evils, but the Macaulyan education system has its own pros and cons. It is possible through English education to bring about “a class of persons Indian in blood and colour but English in taste, in opinions, in morals and intellect”, and English education would result in a filter down effect by separating the classes from the masses but this system of education pave the wave for divide and rule policy (Gosh 2007). So, this problem needs thorough investigation with proper solution. Actual scientific researches and issues analysis. Macaulayan system of education of pre Colonial period grew, and it has become so hardened that in spite of great efforts at the recovery of Indian pedagogy, we find it extremely difficult to develop and establish in India the real soul of the Indian pedagogy and its new and progressive forms in post colonial era. In fact the problem is very serious, and a good deal of research is required before we can find the right direction and the right remedies to the maladies of present system of education; factories without any direction. Gandhiji believed, ‘"The schools and colleges are really a factory for turning out clerks for Government.’ This paper tries to analyse the problem of Macauayan education system and its impact on pre and post colonial period in India. The research objective. The main objective was to find the possible answers to the above mention problem and its impact. As a part of this research, we have to recognised that the greatness of the Indian system of education, during the periods when it proved to be more fruitful in producing great multisided systems of knowledge, in developing profound and inspiring systems of conduct and character building, in creating economic, social, political and stable systems of civilization, stability and prosperity and in creating inspiring multisided forms of art, literature and other aesthetic and pulsating activities for over all development of man in post colonial India. The statement of basic material. The greatest educationalist, who played important roles in fashioning education systems have, in their quest to develop ideal processes and structure of eduation. The pioneering educational philosophers like Rousseau, Montessori, Pestalozzi, Bertrand Russell, Paulo Freire, and Piaget, it is now being increasingly recognised that education must be based on the psychology of the child-nature. Each human being is a self-developing soul and that the business of both parent and teacher is to enable and to help the child to educate himself, to develop his own intellectual, moral, aesthetic and practical capacities and to grow freely as an organic being, not to be kneaded and pressured into form like an inert plastic material. This new pedagogy impels a further realization of the potentialities of the child and its soul, a realisation that was explicitly stated in the writings of the nationalist leaders who inspired and led the movement of national education in India, such as those of Dayananda Saraswati, Swami Vivekananda, Mahatma Gandhi, Rabindranath Tagore and Sri Aurobindo. Their writings gave a clear expression of the deeper self and the real psychic entity within. In this paper I have tried to revisit the philosophy of education of M.K. Gandhi and Swami Vivekananda who tried to provide solution to the problem generated by Macaulayan education system in India. The basic material is to refer to their views from various authors’ books and articles. Conclusion. M. K. Gandhi and Swami Vivekananda tried to give some solutions to above said problem. Mahatma Gandhi promoted an educational curriculum based on ‘Nai talim’ pedagogical principle. Nai talim is a philosophy of learning and living. It is a call for decolonizing our minds as it holds open our notions of progress, success, freedom, happiness and well-being for critical interrogation. It is also a compass for creating a new politics, new economics, new spiritualities and new non-violent societies. Therefore, it must be continuously re-calibrated and re-imagined in dialectic conversations with what is happening in the world around us. Narayanbhai Desai once told that Gandhiji told him that we each need to create our own definitions of nai talim (basic Education) in order to keep it relevant and alive. We may be able to give to India of today a new pedagogy which would be rooted in the Nai talim education system as propounded by Gandhiji and yet ever progressive soul of India which has the capacity to express itself in new forms appropriate to the needs of the contemporary culture of India and of the world.

Authors and Affiliations

Rina Avinash Pitale Puradkar

Keywords

pre- and post- Colonial India British rule Macaulayan education system education crisis Clerk making machine Indian pedagogy Nai talim non-violence swaraj holistic education pattern

EP ID EP387399
DOI 10.33930/ed.2018.5007.4(3-4)-9
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