Rai Bahadur Rai Bahadur (in North India) and Rao Bahadur (in South India), R.B., was a title of honour bestowed during British rule in India to individuals for outstanding service or acts of public welfare to the Empire. From 1911, the title was accompani ...

Thandalam Gopala Rao (, ) (c. 1832 – 11 May 1886) was an Indian educator who, along with William Archer Porter, was responsible for the growth of the Government Arts College,

Kumbakonam Kumbakonam (formerly spelt as Coombaconum or Combaconum), or Kudanthai, is a city municipal corporation in the Thanjavur district in the States of India, Indian state of Tamil Nadu. It is located from Thanjavur and from Chennai and is the hea ...

in its early stages.

Early life

Gopala Rao was born in a Thanjavur Marathi family in the village of Ganapathi Agraharam near Kumbakonam. His grandfather Thandalam Jeevanna (also known as Ramachandra Pandit) had worked as a ''Tahsildar'' in the service of the

British East India Company The East India Company (EIC) was an English, and later British, joint-stock company that was founded in 1600 and dissolved in 1874. It was formed to Indian Ocean trade, trade in the Indian Ocean region, initially with the East Indies (South A ...

, while his father Raghava Punt served as a revenue officer under Serfoji II. During Rao's infancy, the family moved to Tiruvadi and from there to

Travancore The kingdom of Travancore (), also known as the kingdom of Thiruvithamkoor () or later as Travancore State, was a kingdom that lasted from until 1949. It was ruled by the Travancore Royal Family from Padmanabhapuram, and later Thiruvanan ...

where Gopala Rao served in the Travancore service. Gopala Rao had little schooling but achieved proficiency in

Marathi Marathi may refer to: *Marathi people, an Indo-Aryan ethnolinguistic group of Maharashtra, India **Marathi people (Uttar Pradesh), the Marathi people in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh *Marathi language, the Indo-Aryan language spoken by the Mar ...

Sanskrit Sanskrit (; stem form ; nominal singular , ,) is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan languages, Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in northwest South Asia after its predecessor languages had Trans-cultural ...

and English. At the age of 17, Gopala Rao was employed as a

clerk A clerk is a white-collar worker who conducts record keeping as well as general office tasks, or a worker who performs similar sales-related tasks in a retail environment. The responsibilities of clerical workers commonly include Records managem ...

in the office of the collector of

Tanjore Thanjavur (), also known as Thanjai, previously known as Tanjore,#Pletcher, Pletcher 2010, p. 195 is a city in the India, Indian state of Tamil Nadu. It is the 12th biggest city in Tamil Nadu. Thanjavur is an important center of South Indian c ...

. In 1851, he was promoted Manager of the Department of Public Works.

Educational career

In 1854, Gopala Rao entered the educational department as First Assistant in the newly established provincial school (later Government Arts College) at Kumbakonam. Gopala Rao passed his

matriculation Matriculation is the formal process of entering a university, or of becoming eligible to enter by fulfilling certain academic requirements such as a matriculation examination. Australia In Australia, the term ''matriculation'' is seldom used no ...

in 1857 and graduated in arts from the

Madras University The University of Madras is a public university, public State university (India), state university in Chennai (Madras), Tamil Nadu, India. Established in 1857, it is one of the oldest and most prominent universities in India, incorporated by an ...

in first class in 1859. In 1867, the provincial school at Kumbakonam was elevated to a government arts college. Gopala Rao and William Archer Porter were instrumental for its elevation. They were also credited with having built up the reputation of the college. From 1870 to 1872, Gopala Rao acted as the Inspector of Schools, the first Indian to be appointed to the post. In reward for his success, Gopala Rao was made a fellow of the Madras University. In the same year, he succeeded William Archer Porter as the Principal of the Kumbakonam College and served till 1874. In 1878, Gopala Rao was appointed Professor of History and Political Economy at the

Presidency College, Madras Presidency College is an art, commerce, and science college in the city of Chennai in Tamil Nadu, India. On 16 October 1840, this school was established as the Madras Preparatory School before being repurposed as a high school, and then a gra ...

Death

In 1883, Gopala Rao was struck with fever. He hurried to Kumbakonam for rest. Gopala Rao returned to

Madras Chennai, also known as Madras ( its official name until 1996), is the capital and largest city of Tamil Nadu, the southernmost state of India. It is located on the Coromandel Coast of the Bay of Bengal. According to the 2011 Indian ce ...

soon afterwards but died on 11 May 1886.

References

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Rao, T. Gopala 1830s births 1886 deaths 19th-century Indian educational theorists Educators from British India People from Thanjavur district University of Madras alumni Founders of Indian schools and colleges Scholars from Chennai Educators from Tamil Nadu