Revisiting the Beautiful Tree – 7

Institutions of Higher Learning

The 1822-25 survey of indigenous education in Madras Presidency also recorded the presence of 1,094 ‘colleges’ or institutions of higher learning where 5,431 students were reported to be studying.  Unlike in the case of elementary schools, the reporting on the institutions of higher learning by different collectors was not uniform.  While the collectors of Vishakhapatnam and Srirangapattanam, South Arcot and Tirunelveli gave no information on the ‘colleges’, those of Ganjam, Cuddapah, Madurai and Madras mentioned that there were such colleges which were run privately in agraharams[1], but they did not give any further details concerning them.  The collectors of Bellary and Nellore mentioned the number of such colleges; they however did not give the number of students studying in them separately, but added that along with the number of those studying in schools.  The available details of the number of colleges and the students studying in them are compiled in Table III.

Table III: Institutions of Higher Learning in the districts of Madras Presidency 1822-25

Districts	Number of Colleges	Number of Students
Rajahmundry	279	1,454
Machilipatnam	49	199
Guntur	171	939
Nellore	107	N.A.
Bellary	23	N.A.
Malabar	1	75
North Arcot	69	418
Chengalpattu	51	398
Thanjavur	109	769
Tiruchirappalli	9	131
Coimbatore	173	724
Salem	53	324
Total:	1,094	5,431

Source:    Dharampal 1983:18-19.

Note:        N.A.: Not Available. The information on the number of students studying in colleges is not available for the districts of Nellore and Bellary.

The reports of the collectors also indicate that all those studying in these colleges were male and most of them belonged to the Brahmana community except for 5 students in Rajahmundry district who belonged to ‘Other Castes’.  The community-wise break-up of the 939 students studying in the various colleges of Guntur district was not provided in the collector’s report.

From Table III, it may be seen that, on an average, there were around 5 to 6 students per college during 1822-25.[2]  The highest number of colleges and pupils were found in the district of Rajahmundry, followed closely by Coimbatore and Guntur districts.  While districts like Salem, Chengalpattu, Machilipatnam, North Arcot and Thanjavur had slightly lower number of colleges, the college-student ratio in these districts was higher than the average of around 5.  Malabar had only one institution of higher learning (the college run by the Zamorin of Calicut[3]) with as many as 75 students.

Table IV: Subject-wise classification of Colleges in Madras Presidency 1822-25

Subjects	Districts →	Rajahmundry	Machilipatnam	Nellore	North Arcot	Coimbatore	Total
Vedas	Colleges	198	11	83	43	94	429
Students	1,033	66	N.A.	298	N.A.	1,397
Law	Colleges	60	30	15	24	69	198
Students	358	98	N.A.	117	N.A.	573
Astronomy	Colleges	14	8	8	2	10	42
Students	49	35	N.A.	3	N.A.	84
Andhra Sastra	Colleges	7	…	…	…	…	7
Students	14	…	…	…	…	14
Hindustani Music	Colleges	…	…	1	…	…	1
Students	…	…	N.A.	…	…	…
Total:	Colleges	279	49	107	69	173	677
Students	1,454	199	N.A.	418	N.A.	2,071

Source:    Dharampal 1983:28.  Also the various reports of the Collectors included in the book.

Note:        N.A.: Not Available

The collectors of Rajahmundry, Machilipatnam, North Arcot, Nellore and Coimbatore gave the subject-wise break-up of the institutions of higher learning and, except in the case of the last two districts, also provided the details of the number of students studying in them.  These are summarised in Table IV.  Of the 677 colleges, for which this information is available, 429 (nearly 60% of the total) specialised in Vedas, 168 (25% of the total) in Smriti or Law, 34 in Ganita Sastra or Mathematics and Astronomy, 7 in Andhra Sastra or Telugu Poetics and 1 in Hindustani Music.

Table V: Higher Learning under Private Tutors in Malabar 1822-25

Subjects	Brahmana	Vaisya	Sudra	Other Castes	Total Hindus	Muslims	Total Students
Theology & Law	474				474		474
Astronomy	78	23	195	510	806	2	808
Metaphysics	34			31	65		65
Ethics	22			31	53		53
Medical Science	31		59	100	190	4	194
Total:	639	23	254	672	1,588	6	1,594

Source:    Dharampal 1983:34-35, 198-201

The report of the collector of Malabar also provided details of another 1,594 students who were studying with what he referred to as ‘private tutors’, in addition to the 75 students who were studying in the college run by the Samudrin Raja at Kozhikode.  These details are summarised in Table V.  Of the 1,594 scholars, 808 (constituting over 50% of the total) were studying Astronomy, 474 (nearly 30% of the total) Theology and Law, 194 Medical Sciences, 65 Metaphysics, and 53 scholars were studying Ethics.  Even more interesting is the fact that of the 808 scholars who were studying Astronomy, 195 students belonged to the Sudra community and 510 to the ‘Other Castes’.  Similarly, of the 194 scholars studying Medical Sciences, 59 belonged to the Sudra community and 100 to ‘Other Castes’.  The collector’s report also notes that of these 1,594 scholars undergoing higher instruction in Malabar, 41 were women, of whom 3 were Brahmana women studying Theology and Law, 5 Vaisya women studying Astronomy, and 19 Sudra and 14 women of ‘Other Castes’ who were also studying Astronomy.

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[1] ‘Agraharam’ or ‘agrahara’ is the name given to the area in the village where the Brahmanas lived.  Sometimes, an entire village, which was inhabited solely by the Brahmana community was also named so.

[2] Most of these indigenous ‘colleges’ in the early nineteenth century essentially centred around a high scholar in whose household a number of students were staying and studying gratis.  This fact was noted by the collectors of Machilipatnam, Cuddapah, Guntur and Madurai in their respective reports.

[3] Zamorin of Calicut is the anglicization of Samudrin Raja of Kozhikode.