‘Central Schools were opened after 1956’ – a response

By Usvatte-aratchi-January 1, 2018

The medium of instruction in schools was NOT CHANGED from English to Sinhala and Tamil in 1956 and Solomon Bandaranaike cannot receive accolades or blame for that decision. The credit or blame rightly belongs to J. R. Jayewardene and V. Nalliah in the Legislative Council who together, in 1943, proposed that Sinhala/Tamil shall be the medium of instruction in schools. From my point of view, that legislation was excellent. It has contributed, in part, to the breakup of the monopoly of political power that was held by persons from Colombo, not that I see merit in those came from beyond. Water in all hell would have frozen to ice before all children in this society would have been made literate in English. They are nearly all literate now either in Sinhala or Tamil. Democracy makes no sense when government speaks a language alien to the governed. That was the essence of colonial government.

HL (Prof. Seneviratne) was quite wrong to say that there were English assistant teachers in most primary schools in 1956. (See the Annual Administration of the Director of Education for those years.) We still do not have information about English teachers in all schools including secondary schools. (See the Schools Census for 2016). Most schools in 2017 have an excuse for an English teacher. When Solomon Bandaranaike was elected to office in 1956, children in school were in their 11th year of schooling in Sinhala/Tamil. Dr. P. A. samaraweera of Brisbane does himself disservice when he claims so boldly ‘Central schools were opened after 1956’. The first Central School was opened in 1943 in Matugama and the last in 1947 at Kukiyapitiya. I was a student in Hikkaduva Central School, established in 1944, one of the earliest and the last in Kuliyapitiya, established in 1947.

In Hikkaduva I was taught English in my first year by Miss Prema de Silva, fresh with an SSC from school. (No, she was not waiting for results of the UE examination results.) and I still recall, with pleasure, constructions she taught me. In my second year, I was taught English by Mr. Gamani Weerasekere (SSC) and I often recall ‘Highwayman’ (‘The road was a ribbon of moonlight …’) that he taught us. In the first three years we were taught all subjects, except English, in Sinhala and switched to an all English curriculum in the fourth year. In our last two years we were taught English, as all other subjects, except Mathematics and Pali by people who had no university degrees and several students earned distinction in English (taught by Mr. K. Dahanayake) as well as in other subjects, most of which were taught by Trained Teachers. We were exceedingly well taught to be classed in the First Division, rare at that time, in even ‘ the top schools in Colombo’. Five in that class of 30 went up to Peradeniya in open and fair competition. We were 30 students in our class and 22 of them were girls; feminist, indeed, that far back.

Problems in education arose from the decision to impart education in Sinhala/Tamil in university. In a manner, it was inevitable after school education in those languages. How could those students have been asked to switch toEnglish at university? In a manner, it was not. Students who entered university could have been taught English for two years before they began their course work. Teachers in university were ready to teach in Sinhala/Tamil, as they indeed did. But in Sinhala (Tamil?) there was no material to read and there is no university learning in any discipline without reading. The last time that adults recall learning without reading is usually in kindergarten. In 1959, there were students who looked forward to study in university in Sinhala/Tamil. Sinhala (Tamil?) was and is centuries behind being ready to teach students at university. The wise decision, education wise, would have been to teach in university in English after two years of instruction in English. We had enough good English teachers in the country and it was feasible. And we could have taught in university in English. But wisdom had fled to the wild driven by a frenzy of nationalism. And we decided to teach in university in Sinhala/Tamil.

Sinhala scholarship over the ages had limited itself to Buddhist themes-from amavatura to saddharmratnvaliya, from muvadevdavata to kusajatakakavyaya. From 1500 to2000, there was no book in Sinhala which expanded knowledge. (The major part of the country was not under colonial rule until 1815 so that colonialism is no excuse.) During those five centuries, European vernaculars (Spanish, French, Dutch, English and later German) developed from mere dialects to massive vehicles of newknowledge which shaped the way people lived and thought. And we started teaching in universities in Sinhala without the advantage of a native literature or translations from European languages which the Japanese labelled barbarian but started, in 1664, to translate systematically into Japanese. When the Imperial University of Tokyo was chartered in 1887 it grew from a translation bureau. (I dwelt on this theme at some length in a lecture in June 2017 before a meeting of the National Heritage Trust. I have been advised that the lecture is available on their Blog.)

It is that calamitous fall in university education that both Elmo and HL worry about. It is that decision that the Bandaranaike government is rightly blamed for. Some faculties (Medicine, Engineering and some Departments of Science) of study saw the folly of the decision and found ways of teaching in English. Teaching the humanities and social studies never recovered. Poor learning in universities soon percolated to schools and here we are with barely literate Members of Parliament legislating for us.We are yet to elect a graduate of a university in Sri Lanka as head of state and government.

I go along with Elmo and HL (both, I am privileged to call so) that far. But, I cannot blame the pervasive dishonesty, hypocrisy and other corruption in our society to that decision. I have met far too many Sinhala school teachers who would not steal a pencil from their school for such comment to be permissible. We really don’t know why corruption, criminality and dishonesty are currency of the realm in this land. We do not know the causes of the malaise in our society.