The Beautiful Tree: Indigenous Indian Education in the Eighteenth Century c5.s28.17

c5.s28.17

There are in this District no public institutions for education supported by grants of land or allowances from the government, nor are any known to have existed. The schools which exist are supported by the parents of the scholars. The charge for instruction is variable rising as the scholar is promoted from the lowest to the higher classes. The average for the lowest class is about ¼ rupee per mensem, and increases to 1 rupee and 1½ rupee which rate it rarely exceeds. In the Bramin caste, boys are put to school at the age of 5 or 6 and among the Sudras at from 6 to 8. Boys are said to be kept at school generally no longer than 2 years in which time they are expected to have attained all that they are desired to acquire, that is a certain degree of knowledge of reading, writing and arithmetic in which they are afterwards to improve themselves by practice at home, in a shop, or in a public office. The only schools which can be denominated public in this district are the charity schools at Cuddapah, supported by the European gentlemen of the place. There are no schools or colleges for instruction in the Sciences. Theology, Law and Astronomy are taught privately, the pupils residing in the houses of their preceptors. Besides the instruction afforded in the schools to those whose parents are able to pay for it, it is also given gratuitously in many places by Bramins to those of their own caste who have no other means of obtaining it—young Bramins for the sake of receiving instruction in this way, leave their homes and wait upon the preceptor in his own village, where they are supported by the daily charity of the Bramins residing in it.