114 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES
fulfilment of the declaration made by His Most Gracious Imperial Majesty, the King Emperor, in replying to the address of the Calcutta University on the 6th January, in which he said :—
“It is my wish that there may be spread over the land a network of Schools and Colleges, from which will go forth loyal and manly and useful citizens, able to hold their own industries and agriculture and all the vocations in life. And it is my wish too, that the homes of my Indian subjects may be brightened and their labour sweetened by the spread of knowledge with all that follows in its train, a higher level of thought, of comfort and health. It is through education that my wish will be fulfilled, and the cause of education in India will ever be very close to my heart.”
IV
What about social Reform under the British Government ?
It was Raja Sir T. Madhavrao, a very prominent and progressive Hindu of the last generation, who said:—
“The longer one lives, observes, and thinks, the more deeply does he feel that there is no community on the face of the earth which suffers less from political evils and more from self-inflicted or self-accepted or self-created, and therefore avoidable evils, than the Hindu Community.”
Leaving aside the question of the comparative cost of the observation, there can be no doubt that Hindu Society suffers from social evils as no other community does.
Mahadeo Govind Ranade, another venerable name among earnest social reformers has made another and equally important observation, emphasizing another aspect of the Hindu Community :—
“Mere considerations of expediency or economical calculations of gains or losses can never move a community to undertake and carry through social reforms, especially with a community like ours, so spellbound by custom and authority. Our people feel, and feel earnestly, that some of our social customs are fraught with evil; but as this evil is of a temporal character, they think that it does not justify a breach of commands divine, for such breach involves a higher penalty. The truth is, the orthodox society has lost its power of life, it can initiate no reform nor sympathise with it.”