Page:Calcutta Review (1925) Vol. 16.djvu/508

1925] and to new standards of method in University Teaching under the direct auspices of the University”, and they think that the system is calculated to “inspire solid hopes for the future ”, (Vide Report, Vol. I, p. 76.)

Prof. Sarkar has referred to “public cry for retrenchment and reform” and he has quoted figures from the “daily papers”, illustrating “the Calcutta University’s wasteful methods in the Post-Graduate Department”. We saw before the 1st of July only one daily paper, containing apparently an inspired article to discredit the University by quoting wrong and misleading figures. We do not know if Prof. Sarkar is suffering from the mental aberration of confusing the singular with the plural. But this much is clear that men, sincerely anxious to promote the welfare of the University, cannot be assisted by uninformed and prejudiced criticism abounding in sweeping generalisations of a condemnatory character. To quote only one instance. It is not true that a teacher here delivers only 5 lectures a week against 18 at Dacca. Both the assertions are equally incorrect. In History, for example, the number of average lecture hours per week is not less than 9 or 10 in this University, whereas the number of lecture hours at Dacca would be much less. We have been authorised by Dr. Rameschandra Majumdar, the head of the Department of History at Dacca, to challenge Prof. Sarkar’s figures so far as Dacca is concerned. Besides, the fundamental basis of Prof. Sarkar’s conception of the true function of a University Lecturer seems to us to be entirely wrong. He complains bitterly against a “huge army of young lecturers without enough teaching work for them”. We fail to distinguish which is the greater crime—to be young or not to have enough teaching work. It seems that in the opinion of Prof. Sarkar both are equally grave offences. We have already shown that his second charge at least, that is, want of sufficient teaching work for University Lecturers, cannot be substantiated. Prof. Sarkar no doubt thinks that a University Lecturer essentially