Tamil Nadu Timeline

EducationEast India Company rule

Wood's Despatch on education

· London

Charles Wood's education despatch called for universities in the presidency towns and a graded school system across India.

In 1854 Sir Charles Wood, President of the Board of Control, sent a despatch to the Government of India setting out an education policy. It recommended universities on the model of the University of London in Calcutta, Bombay and Madras, a department of public instruction in each province, grants-in-aid to private schools and more vernacular schooling. In the Madras Presidency it led to a Department of Public Instruction and to the founding of the University of Madras in 1857. It shaped the structure of education in the region for decades.

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