Agarkar : Gopal Ganesh (1856-95); agreed with B.G. Tilak & V.K. Chiplunkar that the education system stipulated by the Minute on Education crafted by Macaulay & imposed by the Govt. in 1835, controlled & directed by the Govt. & Christian Missionaries was perverting India’s future generations. But they saw too that English education itself could be made the surest foundation of national resurgence, solidarity & progress. On 1st January 1880, they started the New English School in Poona, charging less than the Govt. High School & exempting the poor & in a year it had 336 students of which 20% were poor. Encouraged by the interest shown by Sir James Fergusson, Governor of Bombay they formed the Dakshīna English Society & in due course founded the Fergusson College. Agarkar was made a life-member with Tilak & others. But Agarkar remained a social reformer & did not jump into politics. [S.L. Karandikar, Lōkamānya Bal Gangādhara Tilak – The Hercules & Prometheus of Modern India, published by author from Sadāshiv Peth, Poona-2, 1957]
... its past; it worked by a more strenuous and popular propaganda which reached its height in the organisation of the Shivaji and the Ganapati festivals. His separation from the social reform leader, Agarkar, had opened the way for the peculiar role which he has played as a trusted and accredited leader of conservative and religious India in the paths of democratic politics. It was this position which ...
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