Tagore'S View of The Education System in Colonial Bengal

TAGORE’S VIEW OF THE EDUCATION SYSTEM IN
COLONIAL BENGAL.
“My Reminiscences’, originally titled as “Jibansmriti”,

authored by Rabindranath Tagore, renders the readers a
glimpse into his extraordinarily personal world and the
evolution of the poet and his works which otherwise would
have never found its way out into the world. It is a collection
of ‘memory pictures’, as the author himself has put it. The
work takes the readers on a voyage through myriad relevant
and epiphanic junctions of the poet’s life that allows them to
observe the journey of a self-centred and unreal adolescent
who rises to become one of the greatest visionaries and an
advocate of a reformed and revolutionary education system.
This awakening journey or emergence remains evident in
many of his early works, the most prominent being ‘The
Awakening of the Fountain’ (Nirjharaer Swapnabhanga). The
poem is an account of his newly discovered intuition.
Tagore’s philosophy of education emphasised the importance
of aesthetic development of an individual along with the
intellectual, if not more. Dance, music, literature, and drama
were of immense significance in the daily life of the school.
Drawing on his early days at Jorasanko, Tagore attempted to
create an atmosphere where art would become instinctive. In
“My Reminiscences”, Tagore writes that in his adolescence,
“a cascade of musical emotion” gushed forth day after day at
Jorasanko. He further adds, “We felt we would try to test
everything.. and no achievement seemed impossible.. We
wrote, we sang, we acted, we poured ourselves out on every
side.”
Such instances from the text testifies that he possessed an
independent spirit that was not to be caged or chained by a
conventional education system during the colonial era in
Bengal. Staying confined within the concrete four walls of the
school was no less than a torture for Tagore. He was a firm
believer of the fact that to forgive an erring child is the duty of
a teacher and that they play an indispensable role in shaping
the mental makeup of a child through their own behaviour and
manners towards the class: “..how much easier it is to acquire
the manner than the matter...” In the text, he provides
instances of how the system of education plays an active role
in instilling terror, a sense of inferiority, and discrimination
among students, which again is replicated by the children,
“Without an effort had I assimilated all the impatience, the
short temper, the partiality and the injustice displayed by my
teachers to the exclusion of the rest of their teaching.”
Moreover, he was strongly against the practice of rote
learning. Once again, the readers are provided with instances
from the text where he presents the superfluity and futility of
engaging in certain morning routines in school and chanting
verses which did not seem to make any sense to either him or
the rest of the class. Tagore recounts, “before the classes
began all the boys had to sit in a row in a gallery and go
through some kind of singing or chanting of verses...” He
further adds, “we had not the faintest notion what sort of
incantation we were practicing; neither did the meaningless
monotony of the performance tend to make us cheerful.” Most
of the times, the teachings and practices of the school would
barely serve any practical purpose and neither would they
contribute in the holistic development of a child. Hence,
Tagore was strictly against a system that would furnish
meaningless theories and methodologies.
Being a part of an immensely progressive family, Tagore had
the privilege of opting for home schooling and received
informal education, which was such a rarity back in the 19th
century colonial Bengal. Growing up, he was unwilling to
follow the prescribed school course and read what he wanted
to his heart’s delight. Later on, Tagore discarded the concept
of textbooks and held the teachers responsible for imparting
the lessons to the students in a joyful manner. He believed that
the relationship between the teacher and the students should
be one of companionship.
It did not take long for Tagore to understand that the
education system during the colonial period was to plant a
sense of inferiority among the Indians. It was a convenient
way of training them as clerks in their offices which would
allow them to overpower the natives and demean and belittle
them for their own culture and philosophy. Therefore, Tagore
felt compelled to plead for an education system in India
independent of colonial British control. This eventually saw
the inception of the idea of Shantiniketan (abode of peace)
which was later materialised as well. It is an Ashrama style
educational institution where pupils are educated with the
principles of freedom, trust, joy, and cooperation.

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TAGORE’S VIEW OF THE EDUCATION SYSTEM IN

“My Reminiscences’, originally titled as “Jibansmriti”,

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