WOMEN'S EDUCATION IN COLONIAL TIMES : THE PIONEERING EFFORTS OF MARGARET E. COUSIN

Margaret E. Cousins was an ardent worker for the Suffrage in England and contributed
to the awakening of India and to her rights as a great nation. She was one of the women pioneers
who not only worked in the field of Political reform but contributed valuably in the field of
Educational reform for women as well. Paraphrasing Emerson’s saying “ The world is a symbol,
in the whole and in all its parts”, Margaret E. Cousins, once famously pronounced that “India is
a paradox, in the whole and in all its parts”. She thus understood the Indian social reality. Mixing
with the life of the Indian people in their homes, in festivals, in politics, among the rich and poor
and all castes and communities, Cousins found such gentle character, such nuances of
refinement, such inherent intelligence, such response to traditional art and culture, that it was
difficult for her to realize that India had the lowest percentage of literacy in the world.1 She
found that India had the fewest number of its youth in schools and colleges, and the fewest
literate adults of any civilized nation on the face of the earth. She found that in the official
Education Report of 1838, there existed then in Bengal and Bihar as many as 100,000 schools,
that is one school for every 400 children. In 1912 G.K. Gokhale stated that there was at that time
only one school for every six villages in India. By 1930, there were only 5 literate women in
Bihar out of every thousand Bihari women. In the year 1941, Cousins estimated that only 5000
odd institutions in India were intended solely for the education of girls.Thus the condition of
women’s education was abominable.