In the year 1834, there came to India Lord Macaulay.

As the Law Member in the Go vernor-General's Council Bentinck placed him also in charge of education. Macaul ay engaged himself to prepare an educational policy for India. Macaulay had very little knowledge of the East. He had no respect for Oriental l earning or Eastern languages. Naturally, therefore, he condemned the Orientalist s and supported the Anglicist view. Early in 1835, he submitted his famous minut e on Indian education for the consideration of the Government. In that minute, he poured contempt on Sanskrit or Arabic by saying that "a singl e shelf of a good European library was worth the whole literature of India and A rabia." To him it appeared that the classical languages of India contained 'medi cal doctrines which would disgrace an English barrier, astronomy which would mov e laughter in girls at any English boarding school, history, abounding with king s thirty feet high and reigns thirty thousand years long, and geography made of seas of treacle and seas of butter." While condemning the Eastern languages and learning in strongest terms, Macaulay praised English in lofty words. He said, "The claims of our own language, it is hardly necessary to recapitulate. It stands pre-eminent even among the language s of the West....In India, English is the language spoken by the ruling class. It is likely to become the language of commerce throughout the seas of the East. "Macaulay knew it well that it was impossible to earn the English language to t he mass of the Indian people. His purpose was to serve the needs of the imperial administration through English education. He did not think of popular education through vernacular languages. Therefore, h e said. "We must at present do our best to form a class who may be interpreters between us and the millions whom we govern, a class of persons Indian in blood a nd colour, but English in tastes, in opinions, in morals, and in intellect. To that class we may leave it to refine the vernacular dialects of the country, to enrich those dialects with terms of science borrowed from the Western nomencl ature, and to render them by degree fit vehicles for conveying knowledge to the great mass of the population." Macaulay thus suggested making English the language of higher education in India with Western leaching as the subjects of study. Bentinck accepted his suggestio n. Accordingly, on 7th March, 1835, a Resolution was passed by the Government which declared: "His Lordship is of opinion that the great object of the British Gove rnment ought to be the promotion of European literature and science amongst the natives of India, and that all the funds appropriated for the purpose of educati on would be best employed on English Education alone." Bentinck's Resolution opened a new chapter in the history of Indian education. I t was from that time that Western education began to spread in India rapidly. Through the English language there came the Western science, and modern ideas. I n that very year 1835, a Medical College was established at Calcutta to teach Eu ropean medical science to Indian students. All over the country a desire to lear n English developed. Schools and Colleges were gradually established for English education. India cam e under a modern educational system. In the broader context of history, a new co nsciousness emerged out of that new system The Salt March started a series of protests, closing many British shops and Brit ish mills. A march to Dharshana resulted in horrible violence. The non-violent sat

yagrahis did not defend themselves against the clubs of policemen, and many were killed instantly. The world embraced the satyagrahis and their non-violence, and eventually enabled India to gain their freedom from Britain.having far-reaching consequences.