PHILOSOPHY OF HINDUISM 41
Shudra when employed by the three higher classes are very instructive on this point. Dealing with the question of wages to the Shudras, Manu says:—
X. 124. “They must allot to him (Shudra) out of their own family property a suitable maintenance, after considering his ability, his industry, and the number of those whom he is bound to support.”
X. 125. “The remnants of their food must be given to him, as well as their old clothes, the refuse of their grain, and their old household furniture.
This is Manu’s law of wages. It is not a minimum wage law. It is a maximum wage law. It was also an iron law fixed so low that there was no fear of the Shudra accumulating wealth and obtaining economic security. But Manu did not want to take chances and he went to the length of prohibiting the Shudra from accumulating property. He says imperatively:—
X. 129. No collection of wealth must be made by a Shudra even though he be able to do it; for a Shudra who has acquired wealth gives pain to Brahmans.
Thus in Hinduism, there is no choice of avocation. There is no economic independence and there is no economic security.. Economically, speaking of a Shudra is a precarious thing.
In the matter of the spread of knowledge two conditions are prerequisites. There must be formal education. There must be literacy. Without these two, knowledge cannot spread. Without formal education it is not possible to transmit all the resources and achievements of a complex society. Without formal education the accumulated thought and experience relating to a subject cannot be made accessible to the young and which they will never get if they were left to pick up their training in informal association with others. Without formal education he will not get new perceptions. His horizon will not be widened and he will remain an ignorant slave of his routine work. But formal education involves the establishment of special agencies such as schools, books, planned materials such as studies etc. How can any one take advantage of these special agencies of formal education unless he is literate and able to read and write? The spread of the arts of reading and writing i.e. literacy and formal education go hand in hand. Without the existence of two there can be no spread of knowledge.
How does Hinduism stand in this matter?
The conception of formal education in Hinduism is of a very limited character. Formal education was confined only to the study of the