83,635. (Chairman). The witness favoured an arrangement by which Indians
would enter the higher ranks of the service, either through the
Provincial Service or by direct recruitment in India. The latter class
of officers, after completing their education in India, should
ordinarily go to Europe with a view to widening their experience. By
this he did not wish to decry the training given in the Indian
Universities, which produced some of the very best men, and he would not
make the rule absolute. It was not necessary for men of exceptional
ability to go to England in order to occupy a high chair. Unfortunately,
on account of there being no openings for men of genius in the
Educational Service, distinguished men were driven to the profession of
Law. In the present condition of India a larger number of distinguished
men were needed to give their lives to the education of the people.
83,636. The witness himself had spent part of his career in Europe, and
looking back he could say that this had been of great profit to him,
not so much on account of the training he got, as by being brought into
personal contact with eminent men whose influence extorted his
admiration, and create in him a feeling of emulation. In this way he
owed a great deal to Lord Rayleigh under whom he worked, but he did not
see why that advantage should not eventually be secured by Indians in
India under an Indian Lord Rayleigh.
83,637. There should be only one Educational Service, but men who were
distinguished in any subject should not start from its very lowest rung
but should be placed somewhere in the middle of it.
83,638. There were men in the Provincial Service who were very
distinguished; it was all a question of genius. The Educational Service
ought to be regarded not as a profession, but as a calling. Some men
were born to be teachers. It was not a question of race, of course; in
order to have an efficient educational system, there must be an
efficient organisation, but this should not be allowed to become
fossilised, and thus stand in the way of healthy growth.
83,639. In the Presidency College a young man fresh from an English
university was at once appointed a Professor regardless of his lack of
experience, whereas an Indian who passed in highest examination with
honours in India was appointed as an Assistant Professor. This grounding
often made him more efficient as a teacher than the Professor recruited
from England. There were now several Professors in the college, in the
Provincial Service, who were highly qualified, and who lectured to the
highest classes with very great success.
83,640. In the Physics Department he had under his direction several
Assistants who were so well qualified that they were allowed to give
lectures to several classes. These Assistants, after their experience at
the Presidency College, would be best fitted to become Professors in the
mofussil at Colleges. He would like to see them promoted to the higher
service after they had had experience. But before he gave them the
highest positions, he would make it compulsory for them to go to Europe.
83,641. A proportion of Europeans in the service was needed, but only as
experts and not as ordinary teachers. Only the very best men should be
obtained from Europe, and for exceptional cases. The general educational
work should be done entirely by Indians, who understood the difficulties
of the country much better than any outsider.
83,642. He advocated the direct recruitment of Indians in India by the
local government in consultation with the Secretary of State, rather
than by the Secretary of State alone. Indians were under a great
difficulty, in that they could not remain indefinitely in England after
taking their degrees and being away from the place of recruitment their
claims were overlooked.
83,643. There was no reason why a European should be paid a higher rate
of salary than an Indian on account of the distance he came. An Indian
felt a sense of inferiority if a difference was made as regards pay. The
very slight saving which government made by differentiating between the
two did not compensate for the feeling of wrong done. This feeling would
remain even if the pay was the same, but an additional grant in the
shape of a foreign service allowance was made to Europeans. All workers
in the field of education should feel a sense of solidarity, because
they were all serving one great cause, namely, education.
83,644. The term "professor", as at present used in India, was
undoubtedly a comprehensive one, but it was equally comprehensive in the
West.
83,645. (Sir Murray Hammick). The witness did not wish to recruit
definite proportions of the service in England and in India
respectively. He would for various reasons prefer a large number of
Indians engaged in education.
83,646. Even in Calcutta he would not make any difference between the
pay of the Indian and the pay of the European.
83,647. (Sir Valentine Chirol). The witness attached great value to the
influence of the teacher upon the student in the earlier stages of his
education, and it was in these stages that that influence could best be
exercised. At the same time he desired to limit the appointment of
non-Indians to men of very great distinction.
83,648. If a foreign professor would not come and serve in India for the
same remuneration as he obtained in his own country, the witness would
certainly not force him to come.
83,649. (Mr. Abdur Rahim). Recruitment for the Educational Service
should be made in the first place in India, if suitable men were
available; but if not then he would allow the best outsiders to be
brought in. In the present state of the country it would be very easy to
fill up many of the chairs by selecting the best men in India.
83,650. The aim of the universities should be to promote two classes of
work--first, research; and secondly, an all-round sound education. Men
of different types would be required for these two duties.
83,651. (Mr. Madge). Any idea that the educational system of India was
so far inferior to that of England, that Indians, who had made their
mark, had done so, not because of the educational system of the country,
but in spite of it, was quite unfounded. The standard of education
prevailing in India was quite up to the mark of several British
universities. It was as true of any other country in the world as of
India that education was valued as a means for passing examinations, and
not only for itself, and there was no more cramming in India than
elsewhere.
83,652. The West certainly brought to the East a modern spirit, which
was very valuable, but it would be dearly purchased by the loss of an
honorable career for competent Indians in their own country.
83,653. The educational system in India had in the past been too
mechanical, but a turn for the better was now taking place and the
universities were recognising the importance of research work, and were
willing to give their highest degrees to encourage it.
83,654. (Mr. Macdonald). The witness did not think it was necessary to
have a non-Indian element in the service in order to stiffen it up, but
he accepted the principle that there should be a certain small
proportion of non-Indians.
83,655. The title of professor at a college or University should carry
with it dignity and honour, and ought not to be so freely used as at
present. All he asked was that it should not be abolished at the expense
of such Indians as were doing as good work as their European colleagues.
83,656. If the Calcutta university continued to develop its teaching
side, there would be no objection to recruiting University Professors
from aided colleges. This would have certain advantages.
83,657. (Mr. Fisher). The witness desired to secure for India Europeans
who had European reputations in their different branches of study. If it
was necessary to go outside India or England to procure good men, he
would prefer to go to Germany. This was the practice in America where
they were annexing all the great intellects of Europe.
83,658. The witness would like to see India entering the world movement
in the advance and march of knowledge. It was of the highest importance
that there should be an intellectual atmosphere in India. It would be
of advantage if there were many Indians in the Educational Service. For
they came more in contact with the people, and influenced their
intellectual activity. Besides, on retirement they would live in India
and their life experience would be at their countrymen's service.
83,659. There was very little in the complaint made in certain quarters
that the work of the Professors in the colleges in India was hampered by
the Government regulations as to curricula. A good teacher was not
troubled by such matters.
83,660. (Mr. Sly). There was no scope for the employment of non-Indians
in the high schools as apart from the colleges. It was in the
professorial line that more help from the West was required.
83,661. (Mr. Gokhale). The witness knew of three instances in which the
colonies had secured distinguished men on salaries which were lower than
these given to officers of the Indian Educational Service. One was at
Toronto, another was in New Zealand and the third at Yale university.
The salaries on the two latter cases were £600 and £500 a year. The same
held good as regards Japan. The facts there had been stated in a
Government of India publication as follows: "Subsequent to 1895 there
were 67 Professors recruited in Europe and America, of those, 20 came
from Germany, 16 from England and 16 from the United States. The average
pay was £384. In the highest Imperial University the average pay is
£684. As soon as Japanese could be found to do the work, even tolerably
well, the foreigner was dropped."
83,662. When the witness first started work in India, he found that
there was no physical laboratory, or any grant made for a practical
experimental course. He had to construct instruments with the help of
local mechanics, whom he had to train. All this took him ten years. He
then undertook original investigation at his own expense. The Royal
Society became specially interested in his work and desired to give him
a Parliamentary grant for its continuation. It was after this that the
Government of Bengal came forward and offered him facilities for
research.
83,663. In the Educational Service he would take men of achievement from
anywhere; but men of promise he would take from his own country.
83,664. (Mr. Chaubal). He did not know whether the salaries he had
mentioned as having been paid in Japan, New Zealand and Yale were on an
incremental scale or not.
83,665. There was a difference of kind between the way in which
students were taught in schools and the way in which they were taught in
colleges. He did not agree with the witnesses who had said that during
the first year or two years at college the instruction given was similar
to that given in a school. It was very difficult to disprove or to prove
such statements. There would be no advantage in keeping boys to a school
course up the intermediate standard and making the colleges deal with
only those students who had passed the intermediate examination.
83,666. (Sir Theodore Morison). There should be one scale of pay for all
persons in the higher educational department. The rate of salary, Rs.
200 rising to Rs. 1,500 per month, was suitable, subject to the proviso
that the man of great distinction, instead of beginning at the lowest
rate of pay, should start some where in the middle of the list, say, at
Rs. 400 or Rs. 500. He would make no reference in regard to Europeans or
Indians in that respect. In effect this no doubt amounted to making
Indians eligible for higher educational posts both by direct recruitment
and by promotion.
83,667. He would not favour the handing over of all the Government
institutions in Bengal to private agencies; there must be one or two
Government colleges in order to keep up the standard. He should be
sorry to see the Government dissociating itself from one of its primary
duties, which was education.
83,668. Privately managed Colleges paid less in salary than the
Government Colleges. They paid about the same as was given in the
Provincial Service, and they obtained fairly good men. It would not be
right for a great Government to grant a minimum pay to Indian Professors
and an extravagantly high pay to their European colleagues, for doing
the same kind of work.
83,669. At the Presidency College the facilities for scientific work
were now greater than in many institutions in England. India was now
becoming a great country for Biological research. Again, the Physical
and Chemical Laboratories at the Presidency College were finer than many
in England. If young men of science in England thought they obtained
better opportunities in pursuing their subjects in New Zealand and
Toronto than in India, the India office ought to remove that impression
at once.
83,670. (Lord Ronaldshay). When an Indian graduate under the witnesses'
scheme was appointed direct to the higher service in India he would not
compel him to go to England for a period of training. The person who
would be appointed in India directly from the Indian Universities would
have to have previously served with distinction in subordinate
positions; a visit to Europe would be an advantage but not absolutely
necessary.
83,671. (Mr. Biss). The cost of living in Calcutta to an Indian
Professor or Lecturer would all depend as the style in which he lived.
In each service there is always a standard of living to which every
member is expected to conform. An Indian Professor had to go to Europe
from time to time to keep himself in touch with the developments of his
subject. An Indian officer had to support a large number of relations.
The question of a man's private expenses should not be raised in fixing
his pay. One might as well inquire whether the candidate for admission
to the service was a bachelor or married, or as to how many children he
had. He had known Europeans who had led a simple life, and had been all
the better for it.
83,672. He could not understand why men went to Japan and Canada instead
of coming to India on better terms. It was a mystery to him. He thought
it was either sheer ignorance or the spread of the commercial spirit.
83,673. All the students coming to his side of the University, were, as
a rule, keen and anxious to learn; he could not wish for better
students.
83,674. (Mr. Gupta). He desired one service, because he thought it was
most degrading that certain men, although they were doing the same work,
should be classed in a Provincial Service, while others should be
classed in an Imperial Service. The prospect of the members of the
Provincial Service were not at all what they ought to be, and that was
the reason why the best men were not attracted to it.