48 TECHNICAL EDUCATION IN TROPICAL AGRICULTURE 



spirit, and where possible attached to existing universities 

 or existing science colleges. The present position of 

 agricultural education in India indicates that we have 

 started at the wrong end. We have attempted to put 

 education first and inquiry second, and we have handi- 

 capped the very limited expert staff by placing this heavy 

 teaching burden on them. This is being done in a 

 country where elementary education has only reached 

 5 per cent, of the entire population, and consequently 

 there exists no* spontaneous demand for higher education 

 in its highest sense. Until this difficulty has passed away, 

 T consider that we shall achieve a higher efficiency with 

 the staff at our disposal by concentrating the higher 

 teaching in one institute, and using all other institutes 

 as experimental stations and schools for giving instruc- 

 tion of the first class. We are about to put this to the 

 test in the Punjab by substituting for the present diploma 

 course a two years' course of instruction, consisting 

 almost entirely of outdoor farm work with lectures on 

 farm subjects, a few popular science lectures, and some 

 tuition in English and arithmetic. This course is being 

 taken up with the approval of the Board of Agriculture 

 in India. This two years' course will be followed by a 

 further course of two years, in which higher instruction 

 will be given, including agricultural chemistry and 

 botany, and the various other subjects of the old diploma 

 syllabus. Whether the second two years' course is given 

 at Lyallpur or at a college central for several provinces 

 will depend upon the number of students forthcoming. 

 In addition to this class, there is already being given in 

 the vernacular a course for .farmers which extends over 

 six months, and consists entirely of outdoor instruction 

 on the farm in the use of improved implements and the 

 application of improved methods. We have also under 

 contemplation a class for young officers in the Civil 

 Service, in the Irrigation Department, and for assistants 

 in the Provincial and Revenue and Educational services. 

 All of these men during the course of their work have to 

 deal with a farming population, and very often with 

 questions relating to land and crops, and it is considered 

 advisable that they should know something of the system 



