<P> The Jesuits introduced India to both the European college system and the printing of books, through founding Saint Paul's College, Goa in 1542 . The French traveler François Pyrard de Laval, who visited Goa c. 1608, described the College of St Paul, praising the variety of the subjects taught there free of charge . Like many other European travelers who visited the College, he recorded that at this time it had 3,000 students, from all the missions of Asia . Its Library was one of the biggest in Asia, and the first printing press was mounted there . </P> <P> As a result of decades of lobbying by the likes of William Wilberforce, and Charles Grant, the 1813 renewal of East India Company's charter carried a duty to educate, and assist previously excluded Christian missionaries to educate the population, in addition to the Company's corporate activities . The Company's officers were divided as to how to implement this imposed duty, with the orientalists, who believed that education should happen in Indian languages (of which they favoured classical or court languages like Sanskrit or Persian), while the utilitarians (also called anglicists) like Lord William Bentinck, and Thomas Macaulay, strongly believed that traditional India had nothing to teach regarding modern skills; the best education for them would happen in English . Macaulay called for an educational system that would create a class of anglicised Indians who would serve as cultural intermediaries between the British and the Indians . British education became solidified into India as missionary schools were established during the 1820s . Macaulay succeeded in replacing Persian with English, as the administrative language, the use of English as the medium of instruction, and the training of English - speaking Indians as teachers, through the English Education Act 1835 . He was inspired by utilitarian ideas and called for "useful learning ." </P> <P> In 1854 the Wood's despatch to the then Governor General Dalhousie stipulated a number of reforms be made to the Companies Education system, in British India . </P> <P> The effectiveness of the measures stipulated in the Wood's despatch were subsequently reviewed and a number of subsequent changes made following the publication of William Hunter's Report of the Indian Education Commision 1882, in 1883 </P>

Education system in india during the british period