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By:

Commodore S.L. Deshmukh

31 October 2024 at 3:00:19 am

The School That Changed India

In the closing decades of the 19th century, education in India was less a public good than a colonial instrument. The British administration had little interest in creating a broadly educated society. Inspired by the logic of the 1854 Wood’s Dispatch, it sought instead to cultivate a narrow English-speaking elite capable of staffing the lower rungs of the imperial bureaucracy. Schools and colleges produced clerks, not citizens. For the overwhelming majority of Indians, education remained an...

The School That Changed India

In the closing decades of the 19th century, education in India was less a public good than a colonial instrument. The British administration had little interest in creating a broadly educated society. Inspired by the logic of the 1854 Wood’s Dispatch, it sought instead to cultivate a narrow English-speaking elite capable of staffing the lower rungs of the imperial bureaucracy. Schools and colleges produced clerks, not citizens. For the overwhelming majority of Indians, education remained an unattainable privilege rather than a pathway to opportunity. Stifled Aspirations If men faced exclusion, women confronted near-total invisibility. The 1891 Census recorded female literacy at a microscopic 0.42 percent, compared with 8.44 percent for men. Formal education was largely confined to daughters of affluent, progressive urban households. For rural women and those from disadvantaged communities, schooling scarcely existed. Child marriage, rigid patriarchal customs and the confinement of women to domestic life combined to ensure that literacy remained a distant aspiration. Yet, history changes because individuals decide that prevailing assumptions deserve to be challenged. The latter half of the 19th century witnessed the emergence of Indian social reformers who questioned inherited orthodoxy. Figures such as Raja Ram Mohan Roy began attacking customs that denied women dignity and opportunity. Their campaigns met fierce resistance from conservative opinion while operating within the constraints of colonial rule. Nevertheless, they planted the intellectual foundations for one of modern India's most profound social transformations. Among those who carried that movement to its logical conclusion was Maharshi Dhondo Keshav Karve. Born in 1858 in Sheravali village in Maharashtra’s Ratnagiri district, Karve’s early life offered little indication that he would become one of India’s greatest educational reformers. Raised in modest circumstances, he pursued learning with remarkable determination, graduating in mathematics from Mumbai’s Elphinstone College before teaching at Pune’s Fergusson College. It was there that he confronted the grim realities facing widows and women denied even the most basic educational opportunities. At a time when widow remarriage invited social ostracism and women’s education was dismissed as dangerous, Karve devoted himself to both causes. His conviction rested on the deceptively simple proposition that a nation could not hope to progress while excluding half its population from education. Women’s education was no charity but an investment in national development. That belief acquired institutional form in 1896 with the establishment of the Maharshi Karve Stree Shikshan Samstha in Hingne in Pune’s Karve Nagar. Its beginnings could scarcely have been humbler. The institution functioned from a tiny hut, admitting just four girls, many of them child widows whom society had effectively abandoned. Resources were scarce, public support limited and opposition intense. Yet Karve understood that enduring reform begins not with grand declarations but with functioning institutions. Radical Experiment The experiment steadily expanded. A women's school followed in 1907, where Karve’s own widowed sister-in-law, Parvatibai Athavale, became its first student - a deeply personal affirmation of his ideals. His greatest achievement arrived in 1916 with the founding of SNDT Women’s University, India’s first university dedicated exclusively to women. Long before phrases such as “women's empowerment” entered official vocabulary, Karve had already translated the concept into educational practice. Today, the Maharshi Karve Stree Shikshan Samstha educates more than 32,000 girls through dozens of institutions across Maharashtra, serving students from disadvantaged communities, tribal populations and economically weaker families. What began with four pupils in a hut has become one of India’s largest networks devoted exclusively to women's education. Its expansion tells a larger story about India itself. Educational reform succeeds not merely because governments legislate it, but because visionary individuals create institutions that outlive them. Karve’s legacy survived changing political regimes, economic upheavals and shifting social attitudes precisely because it rested on durable foundations rather than passing slogans. That legacy is preserved in the Maharshi Karve Museum in Pune, established on his 150th birth anniversary. The museum displays his personal belongings and chronicles a life defined not by dramatic gestures but by extraordinary perseverance. Visitors encounter more than the biography of a reformer; they encounter the origins of an educational revolution that quietly reshaped Indian society. India today debates artificial intelligence and global university rankings. These conversations risk obscuring a more fundamental truth. The country’s educational transformation began not with technology or policy frameworks, but with a moral conviction that every individual deserves the opportunity to learn. And Karve recognised that principle long before it became fashionable. (The author is a retired naval aviation officer and a defence and geopolitical analyst. Views personal.)

Clever seat selection helped BJP to secure historic win

The party won 65 seats against Congress, 37 against NCP (SP) and 29 against Shiv Sena (UBT)

Clever seat selection

Mumbai: The BJP’s strategic seat sharing with the allies has proved beneficial for the party. An analysis of the Assembly election results show that the BJP has scored over its main rival, the Congress, in a big way because of the direct fights.


The analysis shows that BJP defeated all three constituents of the Maharashtra Vikas Aghadi (MVA) – Congress, Shiv Sena (UBT) and NCP (SP) – in the direct fights. This is attributed as one of the reasons for the BJP’s historic poll success.


The BJP contested 147 out of 288 seats. In 76 constituencies, it faced Congress. BJP secured victory in 65 seats and lost only 11 seats, making it a whopping 86 per cent of the total direct fights. This was followed by an even stronger performance against NCP (SP). Of the total 39 fights with Sharad Pawar’s party, BJP captured 37 seats making it 95 per cent of the total fights with NCP (SP). BJP and Shiv Sena (UBT) were head-to-head in 32 constituencies, of which BJP emerged victorious in 29 seats, making this 91 per cent of the total direct contests.


According to a BJP strategist the party had bargained hard with its allies, Shiv Sena and NCP to get the desired constituencies in the seat sharing formula. “We had studied to potential candidates of the MVA. That helped us in choosing the seats where we can register comfortable victories,” the strategist said.


BJP spokesperson Niranjan Shetty attributed the success to all the party workers who worked hard to boost development, infrastructure in the state. He gave credit to Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis for his contribution to the party’s success.


Shetty pointed out that in 2019, Uddhav Thackeray had stalled all the “novel” and “legendary” projects that Fadnavis had started when he had taken over as CM, making it very easy for the people of Maharashtra to strike a comparison between both the leaders and the potential they had for serving the people. “Devendra Fadnavis gave up his post very easily for the larger good. There are many such examples like Venkaiah Naidu who was BJP National President and later worked as the Vice President of India because that was the need of the hour. We seldom care about our posts,” Shetty told The Perfect Voice.


Congress spokesperson Atul Londhe refused to call the election results as the people’s mandate. “This is not at all a Janata mandate. Despite Maharashtra struggling with so many basic social issues, how can BJP acquire such a huge mandate is the question. If a student copies and fails with just passing marks, it can go unnoticed, but if a student copies and bags the number one position, something is fishy. Why is the BJP scared of ballot papers?” he said.

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