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The three-member committee appointed
by HRD Minister Arjun Singh to vet the NCERT textbooks which gave India's
"eminent" (read Marxist) scholars so many sleepless nights, has only ended
up vindicating the worst fears of sceptics: that the whole exercise was
one big farce hiding behind a slogan.
Eager to please their political
masters, the product of the panel's two-week-long exercise, 'Report of
the Panel of Historians', makes only sweeping generalisations and self-righteous
condemnations.
Savour this: "The textbooks definitely show printing errors, inaccuracies and a strong bias in favour of one interpretation of the Hindu religion that challenges the coexistence over time of varied currents in India's historical unity in diversity."
But they have failed to present even one substantial example to convince anybody of this, outside the charmed circle of "eminent historians".
Last August , NCERT had already survived the Indian History Congress' 'Index of Errors'. The HRD Minister's team had JS Rajput's stinging riposte, 'Fallacies in the IHC Report' with them. Aware of the pitfalls of getting into another debate over historic facts, their eminences thought up something disingenuous.
They exploited the well-known tendency of most newspaper hacks to arrive at conclusions by reading only the introductory parts of reports. This they did by packing in as much newsy rhetoric in the first few pages as possible. That assured their "secular" bosses of enough media mileage. It also ground to dust the dignity of their academic rivals - twin motives of dishonest intellectuals since time immemorial.
Now here are some jewels from the part on "Salient Errors". First S Setar, the telegenic expert on ancient India. He goes through the Social Science text book for Class Six with a sieve. And what does he produce after guzzling public money? Comments like "irrelevant", "controversial", "emotional" and hectors author Makkhan Lal on how to restructure innocuous sentences to suit his taste.
On page 58, paragraph 1, Mr Lal begins a sentence: "These are Egyptian, Mesopotamian, Greek...". Setar orders-"Change to: These are Mesopotamian, Egypt, Greek..." Likewise, on Page 70, paragraph 5, Lal is chided for writing: "Some of the important Roman kings.." But Setar thinks Lal should have written: "Some of the famous Roman rulers were.." On page 107, Lal had tried to help his 11-year-olds readers understand that Karle and Bhaja are in Pune. This is too much for Setar who would rather leave the young learners guessing.
The lengthiest diatribe is spared for the eternal bee in the Marxists' bonnet : the Vedic civilisation. Setar writes in bold typeface: "This chapter raises many controversial, irrelevant and out of context issues. Hence the entire chapter is to be rewritten or replaced by suitable material. The main drawbacks are... too lengthy, debateable.."
Comments Lal to The Pioneer: " He does not say that I am wrong because that would expose his own ignorance. I have quoted facts as contained in all the leading historic works. As for length, there are only 225 words and this covers everything including ancient India's scientific achievements. Is Setar trying to say that an Indian child has no right to learn even the bare minimum about his ancient heritage?"
Meanwhile, another "eminent" member of the panel, JS Grewal, took on Medieval India, the textbook for Class 11 students. He too takes of the millennium: no specific charges as to factual inaccuracy, but lots of hectoring on this line here and that passage there.
There is also gross misrepresentation of facts. His opening comment : "Kabir appears very briefly in this book...only one sentence is devoted to him" is just one example. Actually, about 150 words are written on this great savant over pages 125-126.
A disgusted Meenakshi Jain, author
of the NCERT book on that period, said: "It appears Grewal did not even
read my book. He should explain his conduct because he has spent taxpayers'
money and taken the Ministry and the nation for a ride. Propriety demands
that he admit his failure to properly discharge his duty, and refund all
expenses incurred upon him for his assignment."
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