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DHURRUMTOLLAH STREET: WAY TO BENGAL RENAISSANCE

May 9, 2019Appliances/ Amenities, Bazaars/Superstores, Bengal Renaissance, Blacks, british rule, Communications, Company Rule, Educational Institution, Export/ Import, Industrial Houses, Life Styles, Living Conditions, Locales, New Township, People, Racial Profile, Religious Profile, Shops/ Markets, Ways of Life, Whitesamerican unitarian, and music records, andrew yule, animal-drawn carts, atheist teacher, auctioneers, barbarians, bengali mind-set, bengali renaissance, birbhum gravel, birji, bond and free, book-sellers, bowreah cotton mills, brahmoite, bullocks, burrabazar, calcutta connections, Camels, camera shops, capital goods surman’s park, carrebean, chandney bazar, chandney market, chemists, chowringhee, city of shop-keepers, coach-making, colinga, construction, consumer goods, coolies, david drummond, David Hare, dean mohamet, dharmatala, dharmathakur, dhurrumtollah academy, dhurrumtollah bazar, dhurrumtollah milieu, dingabhanga, doctors, dundee, dwarkanath, edward ives, elephants, engineers, entrepreneurial backwardness, esplanade, ethiop, eura¬sians, european district, expatriated british, fort gloster, fort william, free society, global town, govindpore, govindpore fort, gramophone players, grey town, gueber, hair-dressing, hammersmith high¬way, hindu, horse doctors, horsemen, horses, indian entrepreneurship, industrial capitalist, industrial production, industrial revolution, industrialization, industrialization produced a new market economy, international commerce, jala colinga, james augustus hickey, Jaunbazar, jew, jewelers, job opportunities, jurymen, justice le maitre, jute mill, Kumartooly, learning society, lifestyle, lindsay street, lord clive, madan theatres, manchester chamber of commerce, medical practitioners, midwifes, mobilization, mookherji’s magazine, murgihatta, mussulman, octavius, or palanquin-bearers, p c ray, park street, photographers, photographic studios, pritaram das, professional cameramen, professors of music, projectors and films, public-private partnership, publicans, rani rashmoni, rishra, road-labourers, Rudyard Kipling, sambhoo churn, scythians, shoe-making, Sobhabazar, steam- industries, tailoring, talpooker, taltola, tank square, tanning, tavern-keeping, textile industry, the mind-makers, town calcutta, transportation, under¬takers, watch-making, western education, white town, wine-dealing, young bengalঅযান্ত্রিক

A triple portrait of the East India Company ship Royal Charlotte – Indiaman (1758-1770. Oil on canvas by Robert Dodd. Couresy: National Maritime Museum,

নবজাগরণের যাত্রাপথে ঐতিহাসিক ধর্মতলা স্ট্রিট

LEAD UP
As early as in May 1772 when Dean Mohamet (1784–1851) arrived, Calcutta was already a major center of commerce for the English East India Company, prosperous and entrepreneurial. [Dean Mahomet] Calcutta was then just a township desperately in need to grow into a city to fulfill the common ambition of the Company Bahadur and the British colonialism under the administration of Lord Clive and his immediate followers. It is interesting to note that the Industrial Revolution, the critical turning point in modern history, had its origin in village Sutanuti cotton market that allured the British traders to settle and exploit. The wave of Industrial Revolution, which had started a decade ago in Britain with manufacturing of textiles, reached the shore of river Hughly by then, and let its impact felt in the planning for Town Calcutta expansion beyond the up-coming Fort William at Govindpore. Its chronicle gradually discloses a co-relation between industrialization and urbanization.

It all started with the initiation of the new Fort that set off huge mobilization of the Europeans southward and of the natives of Govindpore to Kumartooly, Sobhabazar, and Burrabazar at north and to Taltola at east. Both the parties had to spend lengthy time experimenting with new realities before they settled themselves in changed environment. That was the time since when new occupations being introduced as the unheard-of opportunities coming up as a result of scientific inventions and industrial diversification. Calcutta in the process of urbanization started experiencing effect of industrialization. The external economic orientation of Calcutta to England emerged in18th and 19th centuries, provided the young city with an industrial prospect. It took however pretty long time to develop some minimum indigenous technological systems of production, transportation, construction, and the logistics required for large concentrations of people in urban areas. [Ghose] The progress slowed down because of the typical political apathy and cultural lethargy of colonial Calcutta.

Merchant Ship at Old Fort ghat Calcutta. c.1798. Artist Francis Balthazar Solvyns. Source: Peabody Essex Museum

Calcutta Merchants. Diversified group of Persians, Arab, Jews, Marwarrees, Armenians, Mundrazees. Cashmeerees, Malabars, Goojratees, Goorkhas, Affghans, Seiks. Turks. Parsees. Chinese, Burmese, and Bengalees. 1849. Lithograph byColesworthey Grant.

THE CLIMATE

Until 1813 the commercial relations between India and England was free from industrial capitalist exploitation. Trade with India had been relatively small. Its huge potential, however, was foreseen by the industrial capitalist who wasted no time to frame policies for maximizing capital gain to feed British machine industry. They defined their policy with the objective, set out by the Manchester Chamber of Commerce, to make India an agricultural colony of British capitalism, supplying raw materials and buying manufactured goods. British rule brought the destruction of traditional handicrafts as well as their technical proficiency, carried off plunder, and revenue extraction. [Sarkar] By 1814 the Company servants themselves had begun to invest their capital in Agency Houses born out of an alliance between the private trading interests of the Company’s servants and the Free Merchants. This unseemly alliance had been continuing since early days of East India Company. We understand from a scholarly note on the Company’s ship Royal Charlotte – Indiaman (1758-1770) featured at the top, that the Company placed bulk orders for official goods with the ships’ captains and supercargoes encouraging the flourishing network of private trade that supported the regular inflow of luxury commodities into Europe. This form of ‘regulated corruption’ was sanctioned through indulgences in Company policy. [Davies]

Despite all the mighty negative forces driven by the political machinery, industrialization happened in Bengal as well as other provinces in India at uneven pace mostly on European initiatives, excepting few instances of Indian entrepreneurship. Calcutta and its neighborhood were on the threshold of a small scale industrial revolution. The local business community embarked upon a broad range of steam-powered industries. Calcutta became ‘a seat of numerous extensive manufactories, vying with many British cities.’ [Stocqueler] The scenario changed in the second half of the 19th century. Faster transportation, and a uniform legal framework, in particular, expanded possibilities of capital and labour movements. ‘The Empire encouraged factor-market integration, increased the scope of public-private partnership and the separation of banking from trading and of trading from manufacturing. This diversification of risk was a key impetus to the industrialization drive.’ [Ray] It was the English who exploited the opportunities most. The natives of Calcutta missed it almost because of their so called entrepreneurial backwardness – a deeply-seated socio-cultural attitude. ‘Power over land, not mercantile or industrial enterprise, was the economic hallmark of social statuses.’ Trade was associated with low ranking castes, Brahmins and Kayasthas considered only the intellectual and administrative professions as proper occupations. Thus the indigenous Bengali elite turned its back on business and left modern industry and international commerce in Calcutta to Europeans. [Sarkar] Neither the shrewdness of colonial policy nor the apathy of general Bengalese toward business could stop Industrialization Revolution that brought forth radical and innovative changes in manufacturing and transportation from manual to mechanical mode. We may note in this context that it all had started with the bonanza of British textile industry at the cost the death of Indian cotton hand mill tradition. The first textile industry in India, Bowreah Cotton Mills, was established in 1818 by British at Fort Gloster near Calcutta; the first jute mill at Rishra started spinning in 1855 when they brought its machinery from Dundee. Industrialization produced a new market economy, and most importantly, a new society desirous of using innovative products and transports to set the revolution go.

Dhurrumtollah Bazar – a section of the coloured lithograph depicting Catholic Church of the Sacred Heart created before 1838 (pub. 1848) by Sir Charles D’Oyly. Courtesy Heidelberg U Univ.

DHARRUMTOLLAH IN CONTEXT

Walking around the Dhurrumtollah Street we may still find few footprints of Industrial Revolution that modernized the ‘process of manufacturing consumer goods and capital goods and of building infrastructure in order to provide goods and services to both individuals and businesses.’ The industrial orientation was discernable more markedly in the new township around the Fort covering the entire southern expansion up to Surman’s Park including villages of Govindpore, Birji, Chowringhee and sections of Colinga – the area commonly understood today in terms of east and west Dhurrumtollah. That time Taltola, or Talpooker, with its segment Jaunbazar was an undeveloped swampy land of Colinga mouza nearest to ‘Bazar of Govindpore on the site of Fort’ (also referred to as ‘Dhurrumtollah Bazar). The only landmark it had was a shrine of Dharmathakur, or the Dharmatala. A road to Dharamtala that known to exist in 1762 as a causeway immediate north of Dingabhanga or Jala Colinga was reinforced with Birbhum gravel in 1796 just after the new Dhurrumtollah Bazar established. [Setton-Kerr]

Old Jaunbazar Native Shops. Chromolithograph By William Simpson. 1867. Courtesy: BL

Portrait of Rani Rashmoni recreated based on an anonymous painting.

As we have already noticed, during the time of expansion of the Town Calcutta and construction of the new Fort, there had been massive mobilization from all directions. The Europeans moved toward south, the Govindpore villagers toward north and east where the later had to take up new occupation for living. In addition, there had been a steady inflow of people from outside India of varied cultural background and expertise for doing business or working as professionals or employees in government and private institutions. The uprooted Govindpore folks gained prospect of living in civil areas and availing new job opportunities in exchange of homes they lost. The opportunities were not limited to serving the European and the Native aristocracy as domestics, but also in public places and at the Fort site as coolies, road-labourers, or palanquin-bearers who in those early days were customarily natives of Bengal. So far we understand, the Hindu settlers from Govindpore had no serious involvement in the process of developing Dhurrumtollah into a neighborhood of historical importance. In our collective mind, the area of ‘Dhurrumtollah’ today no more includes the eastern part of Jaunbazar, which found its own identity after Pritaram Das had built his palatial house in 1810s – the hallowed site where Rani Rashmoni, his daughter-in-law, lived her distinguished life of spiritual, social and political significance. As we conceive, Dhurrumtollah of recent time comprises the entire area between the Lindsay Street and the Dhurrumtollah Street. The road was widened up in 1836 allowing the adjacent land to develop fast into a modern colony next to Chowringhee, but unlike Chowringhee, it was for people of all shades, not white alone. So to speak, such liberal inclusion was a striking exception to the administrative directions pronounced for removing ‘native inhabitants from the black town and to build houses for themselves on another spot, at a greater distance from the fort’. We gather from the English traveler, Edward Ives that this was ‘owing to the governor and council’s resolution in consequence of Colonel Clive’s advice, to enlarge and well secure Fort William, which could not be done, whilst the Indian town was standing. [Ives]

Roman Cathooic Church on Dhurrumtollah Street. (post card picture)

Dhurrmtollah Street in 1880s. Photograph: Johnston and Hofman. c1880s

Westward view of Dhurrumtollah Street. n,d. (picture Postcard) Courtesy: Ebay

Methodist Church from Wellington Crossing

From The Statesman House rooftop. Glenn S. Hensley. 1944

The White Town concentrated around the Tank Square. The region centering on the Govindpore Fort, including Chowringhee, Park Street, Dharmatala, Esplanade, formed the European part of the town. [Wallace] Dharmatala, though commonly designated as a European district, can hardly justify so by its mixed populace and liberal lifestyle, which has been encouraged to diversify further culturally and economically, keeping pace with the changes taken place in global societies through ever increasing Calcutta connections.

Of the Nations Most Known in Hindoostan. Solvyns, Les Hindous, Vol. III. 1811

The crowd of Dhurrumtollah Street is always different from anywhere else in Calcutta – “full of the People of India, walking in family parties and groups and confidential couples. And the people of India are neither Hindu nor Mussulman — Jew, Ethiop, Gueber, or expatriated British” (like James Augustus Hickey, Justice Le Maitre, or a David Drummond). “They are the Eurasians, and there are hundreds and hundreds of them in Dhurrumtollah now.” [Kipling] Because of the presence of British insiders, Dhurrumtollah milieu is essentially more inclusive than the grey town Murgihatta, and may be justly called a global town. On this road, Rev. C Cesry found in 1881 many faiths, many occupations, and many institutions existing next to each other. [Cesry] The road becomes congested with swelling population and their multifarious activities – commercial, professional, humanitarian, devotional, and recreational.

Calcutta may aptly be called ‘a city of shop-keepers’ if ‘getting and spending’ proves to be the essence of its economic life. This was what Sambhoo Churn wrote in Mookherji’s Magazine in 1861. The most respectable of its inhabitants were merchants, and the next might be the judiciary and law practitioners in Calcutta. Those days their profession found highly profitable. So were the medical practitioners. Englishmen in those days carried on other professionals as well. They were jurymen. Besides, they were engaged in different trades as coach-making, watch-making, tavern-keeping, tailoring, wine-dealing, shoe-making, hair-dressing, tanning and the like. [Biswas]

NEW PHENOMENA
A glance through the street directories of late 18th century or early 19th century Calcutta should show the changing pattern of occupations in Dhurrumtollah Street with “addresses of Engineers, Under¬takers, Chemists, Doctors, Midwifes, Photographers, Professors of Music, Horse Doctors, Auctioneers, Jewelers, Book-sellers, Publicans, Barbarians, Scythians, Bond and Free. [Cesry] There were more, most importantly the teachers who contributed singularly to awakening of a new Bengal. The role of Dhurrumtollah Academy of David Drummond and certain other extraordinary institutions carried out gently their grand missions on this rowdy street of ‘shops and bazars’. To Rudyard Kipling the street was like Hammersmith High¬way – the main shopping street in Hammersmith, London.

Bourne & Shepherd. Initially established by William Howard in 1840 as Calcutta Studio. ; renamed in 1866 by Samuel Bourne and Charles Shepherd.

Daguerreotype camera used in the early 19th century in the physics lab Presidency College Courtesy@TimesFreshFace

Annapurna Dutta, a Bengali photographer, appeared on the scene in the 1920s.

Gauhar Jaan – the first Indian voice recorded on gramophone in 1902. Cut 600 records in 20 languages. A Dhurrumtollah resident. Courtesy: TOI

As we have elsewhere discussed at length about the old bazars of Dhurrumtollah, including the Chandney Market that still exists. [puronokolkata] The old Chandney was altogether a different class of market. It was set to cater raw materials like cloth lengths, threads and needles, or tools like scissors, knives, hammers or a fishing rod, but barely any ready-made consumer goods like garment to wear or fishes to eat. It was also a good shopping centre for household wares. I believe it still continues with the tradition to a large extent. This apart, I like to draw your attention to the variety of specialty shops in Dhurrumtollah locality that sale, repair and offering services and products of modern technology.

Madan Theatre by Night” by Gaganendranath Tagore. Held at National Gallery of Modern Art, New Delhi. Image Courtesy: NGMA

There was no dearth of photographic studios, camera shops, professional cameramen, gramophone players, and music records, projectors and films, and above all there was the pioneering Indian cinema production company, the Madan Theatres to show how very receptive the ambience of Dhurrumtollah has been to innovative merchandise. Even today one goes there for a treasure hunt for rare music records, and some finds the master mechanic for gramophones and cameras in its lanes and bi-lanes. Such experience veritably takes us back to the old days of Dhurrumtollah.

Camel Carriage. Coloured lithograph by F. Jones after Captain G.F. Atkinson. 1860

The scenario Kipling described did not grow overnight but an outcome of a slowly built tradition since 1762 – the time when Dhurrumtollah Street was a muddy road frequented now and then by animal-drawn carts pulled by bullocks, horses, and possibly elephants and camels.
The road became wider in 1867; building plots were numbered in 1843 and revised in 1869. Along with the continuous improvement of the Street and its surroundings, changes take place not only in mode of transportation, or form of vehicle, but in people’s lifestyle and the design of the institutions within the orbit of Dhurrumtollah Street.

OBSERVATIONS
Dhurrumtollah Street is, as we see, one of the few roads of the 18th century Calcutta that may claim to be a distinctive reserve for augmenting the history of making Calcutta a modern City out of the colonial ‘Town Calcutta’. The Street carries the traces of the socio-cultural progress on the route to urbanization basking in the glow of Industrial Revolution. It turned up in Dhurrumtollah rather than in any other part, because of two reasons, I believe. First, it was a free society and a learning society, continuously adjusting itself with new ideas and technological inventions. Second, the resolute role of institutions and few little-known, liberal forward-looking people that made it all happened.

CHAPIN PUMPING ENGINE.Dwarkanath imported this technology from England for his business ventures

Contrary to this view, there is a general notion that ‘the early and prolonged exposure to British administration resulted in the expansion of Western education, culminating in development of science, institutional education, and social reforms in the region, including what became known as the Bengali renaissance.’ [Bengal Chamber] When there is no denying that India owes to the British for the revival of its heritage, the British had little to contribute to the formation of the liberal spirit of Bengal Renaissance simply because they never had such values in their national character founded on the rock of convention.

Neither the contemporary business world had much to effect a change in Bengali mind-set. We know many illustrious names of the 19th century business and industrial leaders, British and Indian, from Andrew Yule to Octavius, from Dwarkanath to P C Ray. Among the Indian entrepreneurs there were many great public figures but hardly any persuasive leader capable of being an agent of social change. When Dwarkanath launched his firm, Young Bengal found a hero, and expected the Bengalis to ‘compete with the nations of Europe and America, not only in English literature, but in fine arts, sciences and commerce’. [Sarkar]

Lithograph by C. E. Pierre Motte (1785 – 1836), after a painting by A Geringer, published by Marlet & Co., later hand coloured c1830

‘Dwarkanath Tagore. Portrait by Count D’Orsay – an album assembled by Lady Georgiana Codrington. [1850s] Cortesy:Alamy

William Carey and Pundit. Engraved by J Jenkins after Home Courtesy:NPG

There had been however many renowned adorable renaissance men, including foreigners like a David Hare, and many more unacknowledged people who readied the Calcutta society at large with their open and inquisitive mind imbibed with liberal values. The society was shaped by those extraordinary minds behind the scene that produced leaders to instill new values in public mind, and influence politics of the land. While the industry, the political power, the social elites all had their respective roles to back the new society to flourish, essentially it was the work of the unaccounted activists – the mind-makers.

ENDNOTE
To illustrate my views I shall present few cases, starting with Chandney Bazar, an obscured offshoot of the industrial age. It will be followed by profiles of some magnificent men who left their invisible signatures on some very important chapters of Calcutta history leading to Bengal Renaissance. They came from dissimilar walks of life at different points of time – two horsemen, one Caribbean the the other French by birth, a atheist teacher of Scottish birth, and one Brahmoite American Unitarian activist. Hopefully, you would enjoy their stories so far unheeded, when come out on puronokolkata pages before long.

REFERENCE
[Anonymous]. 1816. Sketches of India; or, Observations Descriptive of the Scenary, Etc in Bengal. London: Black, Purbury and Allen. https://books.google.com.au/books?id=tEcVAAAAQAAJ&pg=PP1#v=onepage&q&f=false.
Bengal Chamber of Commerce. 2016. Discover Bengal: A Guidebook Of Business Prospects In West Bengal. Calcutta: Bengal Chamber. https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=2ahUKEwi77uKz1PnhAhUk63MBHQ8vDkYQFjAAegQIAxAC&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.bengalchamber.com%2Feconomics%2Fdiscover-bengal.pdf&usg=AOvVaw1V8wDJ0_pSUMaxTwj7VrZ9.
Bengal Hurkaru. 1838. Bengal Directory and Annual Register 1838. Calcutta: Samuel Smith. https://archive.org/details/dli.bengal.10689.14012/page/n5.
Biswas, Oneil. 1992. Calcutta and Calcuttans From Dihi to Megalopolis. Calcutta: Firma KL. https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.149376.
Cesry, Rev. C. 1881. Indian Gods Sages And Cities. Calcutta: Catholic Orphan Press. https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.128152.
Chunder, Bholanauth. 1869. Travels of a Hindoo; to Various Parts of Bengal and Upper India; Vol.1. London: Trubner. https://archive.org/stream/travelsahindoot00chungoog#page/n9/mode/2up.
Davies, Pauline. 2013. East India Company and the Indian Ocean Material World at Osterley, 1700-800, East India Company at Home (May 2013). https://blogs.ucl.ac.uk/eicah/osterley-park-middlesex/osterley-case-study-winds-of-trade/
Dean Mahomet. 1997 The Travels of Dean Mahomet: an eighteenth-century journey through India; ed. By Michael Fischer. California: UCPress,1997 https://www.ucpress.edu/book/9780520207172/the-travels-of-dean-mahomet
Forbes, James. 1834. Oriental Memoirs: A Narrative of Seventeen Years Residence in India; Vol.2. 2nd ed. London: Bentley, Richard. https://archive.org/details/orientalmemoirs00montgoog/page/n10.
Ghose, Benoy. 1960. “The Colonial Beginnings of Calcutta Urbanisation without Industrialisation.” The Economic Weekly, no. August 13: 1255–60. http://www.epw.in/system/files/pdf/1960_12/33/the_colonial_beginnings_of_calcuttaurbanisation_without_industrialisation.pdf?0=ip_login_no_cache%3Dfc8386086015fc6e2268f71b76bece16.
Kipling, Rudyard. 1899. City of Dreadful Night. New York: Alex. https://archive.org/details/citydreadfulnig02kiplgoog/page/n7
Puronokolkata. (2018). Durrumtollah And Its Old Bazars. Retrieved from https://puronokolkata.com/2018/05/08/dhurrumtollaha-bazars/
Roy, Tirthankar. 2014. “Trading Firms in Colonial India.” Business History Review 88 (1): 9–42. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0007680513001402.
Sarkar, Suvobrata. 2013. “Bengali Entrepreneurs and Western Technology in the Nineteenth Century: A Social Perspective.” Indian Journal of History of Science 48 (3): 447–75. http://www.insa.nic.in/writereaddata/UpLoadedFiles/IJHS/Vol48_3_4_SSarkar.pdf.
Sen, Amit pseud. [i.e. Susobhan Sarkar] ]. 1947. Notes on Bengal Renaissance. Bombay: People’s pub. https://archive.org/details/notesonthebengal035527mbp/page/n6.
Setton-Karr, W. S. 1865. Selections from Calcutta Gazettes; Vol.2. Calcutta: Military Orphan Press. https://archive.org/stream/in.ernet.dli.2015.44506/2015.44506.Selections-From-Calcutta-Gazettes–Vol-2#page/n3/mode/2up/search/beerbhoom.
Stocqueler, J.H. 1845. Handbook of India: A Guide to the Stranger and the Traveller, and a Companion to the Resident. 2nd ed. London: Allen. https://books.google.co.in/books?id=SelHAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA348&lpg=PA348&dq=a+seat+of+numerous+extensive+manufactories,+vying+with+many+British+cities.&source=bl&ots=O-V1sg-gc6&sig=ACfU3U1bRKpuM94feKVkwAc3A7wwaWsOPg&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwi8hbmhlO3hAhWKP48KHYEm.
Wallace, Robert Grenville. 1822. Fifteen Years in India; or, Sketches of a Soldier’s Life Being an Attempt to Describe Persons and Things … U.S. Commission of Fish and Fisheries. London: Longman. https://doi.org/10.1016/0003-6870(73)90259-7.

Hindu College, Gol Dighi, Calcutta, 1817

February 22, 2015Educational Institution, English education, Vernacular Educationatmiya sabha, calcutta, chief justice colvile, chitpur, college square, dakhinaranjan mookherjee, David Hare, de'rozio, diwan baidya nath mukherjee, edward hyde east, firinghi kamal bose, francis irvine, garanhata, goldighi, gopee mohun thakur, gorachand basak, hindu, hindu college, j a harrington, joseph baretto, krishnamohan banerjee, maha patshala, maharajah of burdwan, old calcutta, pathsala, Radhakanta Deb, ram gopal ghose, rammohun, ramtanu lahiri, tarachand chakravarty, tejchand bahadur, young bengalঅযান্ত্রিক

হিন্দু কলেজ, গোল দিঘী, কলকাতা, ১৮১৭
“Previous to 1835, all the larger educational establishments supported by Government, with the exception of Hindu College of Calcutta, were decidedly oriental in character” [Review/ James Kerr] . The Hindu College, Calcutta was the earliest institution of higher learning in the modern sense in Asia.
The idea of setting up institution like the Hindu College dawned in the minds of Bengal intelligentsia a year after the Court of Directors of the Company had expressed concern about two distinct propositions – first, the encouragement of the learned natives of India for the revival and improvement of literature; and secondly, the promotion of a knowledge of the sciences amongst the inhabitants of that country. The Board advised the Indian Government not to take initiative in the matter of the education of the people of this country. It was the people themselves who had to take the initiative and to do the needful. See
Sometime in April 1815, Raja Rammohun Roy discussed among few friends about the pressing need for uplifting the society from the swamp of idolatry and superstitions to a higher moral plane and the critical role the proposed Atmiya Sabha might play there. David Hare differed from Raja’s views and suggested founding a College for the education of native youths in Western literature and science, which would be a far more effective means of enlightening them with rational understanding of truth. The proposal was earnestly accepted by Rammohun. Mr. Hare himself soon after drafted a proposal for establishing the College. The proposal was handed over to Sir Edward Hyde East by Baboo Baidyanath Mukherjee, a close associate of Rammohun. On 14th May 1816, Sir Hyde East called a meeting of distinguished native gentlemen and pundits at his house and it was resolved “that an establishment be formed for the education of native youth”. See
The meeting proved to be quite satisfying to Sir Hyde East. Four days after he wrote to J A Harrington, his friend, that one of the singularities of this meeting was that it had brought together members belonging to various castes whom nothing else could have done. This letter did no mention of the name of David Hare, though he was the ‘originator of the plan’, neither the meeting papers did. That might be because of Hare’s usual reluctance to come in the forefront. The case of Raja Rammohun Roy however was different. Although his august name has almost always been found in history books in association with the Hindu College, the fact remains that “Rammohun retired, even before the foundation of the College was formally resolved upon.” He decided to step aside to ensure cooperation and supports of the orthodox Hindus who were not in a mood to help the cause if Raja Rammohun remains connected. The meeting was received with unanimous approbation of all those present including the most eminent pundits, who sanctioned their express support. A large sum of money was immediately subscribed. The fund was later multiplied by the donations presented by Maharaja Tej Chand of Burdwan (Rs 12,000), Gopee Mohun Tagore of Pathuriaghata (Rs 10,000), and the Mullicks of Burrabazar (Rs 25,000). The second meeting, held on Tuesday the 21st May 1816, resolved that the name of the proposed institution was to be “Hindoo College”, and a General Committee was to be appointed for setting its objectives. The Committee was composed of 10 Europeans and 20 Indians – all elite and enlightened members. In its next meeting on the 27th May, Lt.-Col. Francis Irvine and Dewan Baidyanath Mukherjee were appointed as the European and ‘Native’ Secretaries, respectively. The European members, however, withdrew themselves in a body when the Committee met next on 11th June. Their withdrawal was volunteered in accordance with the contemporary governmental policy of non-interference with the local educational affairs, as indicated earlier. Committee continued to work at the same venue. On the 25th June, a sub-committee was appointed, which worked out the Rules for the College, and submitted those on 20th August 1816 to the General Committee for finalization. The Rules, 34 in number, were divided in 3 sections, viz. Tuition, Funds & Privileges, and Government. The primary objective of the institution was defined under the Rule 1 as “the tuition of the sons of the respectable Hindoos, in the English and Indian languages and in the literature and science of Europe and Asia. The set of Rules provided the essential functional framework for the College to begin with. It stated that “the College would include a School designated ‘Pathsala’, and an Academy, designated ‘Mahapathsala’”; that “the work of the school should commence first”; that “the English language shall not be taught to boys under eight years of age, without the permission of the managers in each particular instance.”; that “In the school shall be taught English and Bengali, Reading, Writing, Grammar and Arithmetic by the improved method of instruction”; that “in the Academy besides the study of such language as cannot be so conveniently taught in the School, instruction shall be given in History, Geography, Chronology, Astronomy, and Mathematics, Chemistry, and other sciences”; and many other.
The Committee met on December 12th 1816 to settle appointments of teachers. In its next two meetings on the 6th and the 13th of January 1817 the Committee completed the groundwork for the College to take off. The first batch consisting of 20 male students,13 of them as ‘free scholars’, hailing from Bengali Hindu families, attended their class in a rented house of Gorachand Basak at 304 Chitpur Road, Garanhata, marking the beginning of Hindu College. Between the year 1817 and 1823, the school moved about from place to place. From Basak’s the class shifted to the house of Roopchand Roy in Chitpur Road, and thereafter to the house of Firinghi Kamal Bose, a friend of Rammohun, at 51 Upper Chitpur Road, the place where the General Assembly’s Institution publicly started later. Its next flight was into the heart of the Bow Bazar, and from there the College moved off to a scarcely more congenial vicinity — the well known Tiretta Bazar. In the mean time the Government had resolved to establish a Sanskrit College supported by an annual grant of Rs 30 thousand. The building was planned by B. Buxton and constructed by Burn & Mackintosh. See the – hindu-college--019PHO0000247S3U00003000[SVC2] Hand-coloured photo-print, by Frederick Fiebig in c.1852 Agreeing with the proposal initiated by David Hare, the Government decided later to accommodate the pathsala and the Mahapathsala sections of the Hindu College under the same roof of the proposed two-storied Sanskrit College building in its two one-storied wings. For the erection of the building the Government granted Rs. 1,24,000 and “Mr. David Hare gave up for the benefit of the College the piece of land he owned on the north side of the Gol Dighi. The foundation stone of the building was laid on the 25th February 1824. Three years elapsed before it was ready for the reception of the students. [C. R., June, 1852, pp. 346-48].

On 15th June 1854, the upper section of the school, the Hindu Mahapathshala or the Hindu College, was made an open center for modern liberal education and was separated as Presidency College. The junior section, Pathsala, gained independent status as ‘Hindu School’ – a national heritage of institutional education, history and reform.
The Hindu College, produced the brilliant flowers of ‘Young Bengal’. Kindled by the teachings of their tutor Vivan Derozio, youngmen like Dakhinaranjan Mookherjee, Ram Gopal Ghose, Tarachand Chakravarty, Krishnamohan Banerjee, Ramtanu Lahiri and many others, brought out a revolutionary change in the society by their thoughts and deeds. By them, “a powerful and gigantic social movement was unleashed in Bengal the repercussions of which were felt all over India”.
See

Above, the black and white sketch of the three-part building, captioned HINDU COLLEGE, with the pond GOL DIGHI in front, was drawn by an anonymous contemporary artist.

Hindu School, Gol Dighi, Calcutta, 1817

February 8, 2015English education, Vernacular Educationatmiya sabha, calcutta, chief justice colvile, chitpur, college square, dakhinaranjan mookherjee, David Hare, de'rozio, diwan baidya nath mukherjee, Educational Institution, edward hyde east, garanhata, goldighi, gopee mohun thakur, gorachand, hindu, hindu college, joseph baretto, krishnamohan banerjee, maha patshala, maharaja radhakanta deb, maharajah of burdwan, old calcutta, pathsala, ram gopal ghose, rammohun, tarachand chakravarty, tejchand bahadur, young bengalঅযান্ত্রিক

হিন্দু স্কুল, গোলদিঘী, কলকাতা, ১৮১৭
Hindu School, the junior section of the Hindu College, is reputed to be the oldest and leading institution in India to impart modern education to the young students in European and Oriental subjects. The School, designated Pathsala, was established in 1817 along with the Hindu College, designated Mahapathsala, by stalwart educationalists like David Hare, Diwan Baidya Nath Mukherjee, Maharaja Radhakanta Deb, and others in a ahead-of-era intent.
It all started in the year 1815 when Raja Rammohun Roy entertained a few friends at his house and suggested the establishment of Atmiya Sabha for improving the moral conditions of our countrymen. The Raja was animated with a fervent desire to lift the society from the swamp of idolatry and superstitions to a higher moral plane. David Hare differed from his views and suggested establishment of a College. It was Hare’s considered opinion that education of native youths in Western literature and science would be a far more effective means of enlightening them with rational understanding of truth. The proposal was enthusiastically accepted by Rammohun. That was how the idea of Hindu School and College sprouted.

The General Meeting was held on the 21st May 1816, in a house on the Old Post Office Street that was lately occupied by Chief Justice Colvile, and tenanted afterwards by Messrs. Allen Judge and Banerjee, and a conclave of other lawyers. Among those who did not attend the meeting was Raja Rammohun Roy. Though he had heartily entered into the plans of David Hare, and zealously aided in their development, Rammohun willingly allowed himself to be laid aside lest his active co-operation should mar the accomplishment of the project, saying— “If my connection with the proposed college, should injure its interests, I would resign all connection.” The meeting resolved that an institution for promoting education be established. The institution shall include a Patshala, or a School, and an Academy, Maha Patshala, The former to be established immediately, the latter as soon as may be practicable. The primary object of this Institution is the tuition of the sons of respectable Hindus in English and Indian language, and in the literature and science of Europe and Asia. The English language shall not be taught to boys less than eight years of age, without Manager’s permission. The school shall teach English and Bengali, Reading, Writing, Grammar and Arithmetic by the improved method of instruction. On January 20th , 1817 , The first batch consisting of 20 male students hailing from affluent Bengali Hindu families of Calcutta, met at the rented house of Gorachand Basak at 304 Chitpur Road in Garanhata marking the beginning of Hindu School.

In 1825, with the help of the British Government, a school building was built for 1 lakh 24 thousand rupees, towards the north of Goldighi, now College Square, on a land donated by David Hare. Dewan Baidya Nath Mukherjee was deputed to collect the subscriptions for the new school. Sir Edward Hyde East, Chief Justice of the Calcutta Supreme Court was invited to chair the committee and Joseph Baretto became the Treasurer. The principal donors being the Maharajah of Burdwan Tejchand Bahadur and Gopee Mohun Thakur, each contributing Rupees 10,000. On the opening day there were 20 pupils on the rolls but within the next three months the number swelled to 69.

On 15th June 1854, the upper section of the school, the Hindu Mahapathshala or the Hindu College, was made an open center for modern education including eastern and western philosophy and science and was separated as Presidency College. The junior section, Pathsala, gained independent existence as Hindu School – a national heritage of institutional education, and educational reform. Here, in this Hindu College, by De’rozio and other teachers, a group of young men of Bengal was baptised with the teachings of modern science and social philosophy. It produced Dakhinaranjan Mookherjee, Ram Gopal Ghose, Tarachand Chakravarty, Krishnamohan Banerjee and others, the brilliant flowers of Young Bengal, the makers of Modern Bengal. The tree of education had already taken root and the blossoms everyone could see around. By these students of Hindu College, a powerful and gigantic social movement was unleashed in Bengal the repercussions of which were felt all over India.
See Pearychand Mitra. 1877

The Sketch of the Hindu College building is reproduced from the Calcutta Christian Observer, v. 2, 1833

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