The Beautiful Tree: Indigenous Indian Education in the Eighteenth Century c4.s3.t8.1

c4.s3.t8.1

While several of the collectors observed that no institutions of higher learning were then known to exist in their districts, the rest reported a total of 1,094 such places. These were enumerated under the term ‘colleges’ (as mentioned in the prescribed form). The largest number of these, 279, were in the district of Rajahmundry with a total of 1,454 scholars, Coimbatore came next with 173 such places (724 scholars), Guntoor had 171 (with 939 scholars), Tanjore 109 (with 769 scholars), Nellore 107, North Arcot 69 (with 418 scholars), Salem 53 (with 324 scholars), Chingleput 51 (with 398 scholars), Masulipatam 49 (with 199 scholars), Bellary 23, Trichnopoly 9 (with 131 scholars), and Malabar with one old institution maintained by the Samudrin Raja (Zamorin), with 75 scholars. In most other districts where no such institutions were known, the collectors reported that such learning—in the Vedas, Sastras, Law, Astronomy, Ganeetsastram, Ethics, etc.—was imparted in Agraharams, or usually at home. The data regarding such privately conducted learning in Malabar may be indicative of the extent of such learning in other districts also (discussed in a subsequent section). *Table 6* indicates these and other details more clearly.