Question

Why did James Mill and Thomas Macaulay think that Western education was essential in India

Answer 1

$<b>It was because they thought that the whole Indian literature was worth only one shelf of an European library$

Answer 2

James Mill and Thomas Macaulay felt that knowledge of English would allow Indians to read some of the finest literature that the world had produced; it would make them aware of the developments in Western science and philosophy. The teaching of English could thus be a way of ‘civilising’ people, changing their tastes, values and culture. They also felt that the aim of education should be to teach what was useful and practical. So Indians should be made familiar with the scientific and technical advances that the West had made, rather than with the poetry and sacred literature of the ‘Orient’.