From Madrasas To Modernity: Education, State And Society In Kashmir (1850-1950)

Abstract

Education occupies a pivotal role in both the reproduction of social hierarchies and the organization of material production, rendering it one of the most ideologically charged and institutionally contested arenas of modern life. It functions not merely as a mechanism for sustaining societal equilibrium or enabling economic utility, but also as a critical site where the epistemic contours of ‘knowledge’ and the normative frameworks of ‘truth’ are continually constructed and contested. This paper investigates the historical transformation of the educational landscape in Kashmir between the 1850s and 1950—a period marked by intensified colonial entanglements, internal reforms, and shifting social imaginaries. It explores how traditional systems of learning—rooted in religious, oral, and manuscript-based pedagogies—were gradually displaced, restructured, or hybridized under the pressures of modern educational models introduced by Dogra state without and with colonial intervention/ interlocutors. The study foregrounds the tensions between continuity and rupture, examining the challenges posed to the established educational systems and the multifaceted responses they provoked—from resistance and adaptation to assimilation and reform. Drawing upon a wide range of archival records, official reports, personal memoirs, and contemporary writings, the paper seeks to understand this transformation of education in Kashmir and trace how it became a key site through which broader questions of authority, cultural legitimacy, and socio-political transformation were negotiated in modern Kashmir.