प्राचीन भारत में शिक्षा (डॉ. ए.एस. अल्तेकर - गुरुकुल एवं बौद्ध विहार शिक्षण इतिहास)

VII] PRIMARY EDUCATION 183
the Hindu period. For during the Muslim rule the
government educational effort for a long time was
confined only to the Muslim section of the population ;
Hindus also could not continue to get the same state
patronage for their education and literature, which
was possible under their own rule. This must have
affected the spread of education and the extent of
literacy in the population as a whole, which was
predominently Hindu. If therefore the percentage
of literate male population among Indians as a
whole was about 15 at the beginning of the 19th
century, it may as well have been about thirty
towards the end of the 12th century A. D. At the
time when Upanayana was a reality with the whole of
the Aryan community, we have already seen that the
percentage of literacy in it must have been as high as
80. Towards the end of the 8th century A. D. it had
declined to about 40, as shown already. It further
went down by about another 10 percent by the 12th
century A. D. These percentages however refer to
male population only and are exclusive of the Shudras
and Untouchables, who were as a rule all illiterate.