A dark chapter in the history of NCERT

The recently released NCERT history textbook for Class 8 is riddled with a host of factual and pedagogical issues. While narrative shifts to suit the political party in power have been a common feature of NCERT history textbooks, this is the first time the National Council of Educational Research and Training has completely obliterated facts and ignored decades of academic research in Indian history.

For instance, the Class 8 history textbook completely misrepresents the history of jiziya, a tax paid by the non-Muslim population that exempted them from military service and made the State responsible for their protection. The new textbooks states that it was an incentive for the non-Muslim population to convert — such an assertion is not to be found in any Islamic literature of medieval India.

It further asserts that the Mughal emperor Akbar banned jiziya in the later years of his reign. This is far from being fact. Akbar, who came to power in 1560 CE after Bairam Khan’s regency (1556–60), repealed jiziya for the first time in 1563–64 CE on the grounds of it being a discriminatory tax.

Similar factual inaccuracies were observed in the changes made to the class 12 history textbook, where Aryan migration — backed by genetic studies in Cell and Science, 2019, linguistic and historical evidence — has been challenged by a theory that asserts the Aryans were native to India. This claim is not backed by a single study till date.

Apart from factual inaccuracies, portions about the history of women in medieval India have also been removed. The spectacular reign of Raziya Sultan of Delhi (1236–40 CE) and Nur Jahan, the 16th century Mughal Padshah Begum have been omitted.

Raziya Sultan diplomatically warded off a Mongol invasion (1238 CE), came out of purdah, had coins minted in her name, foiled several attempts by Turkish bandagan (male military slaves) to dethrone her, earned the epithet of ‘Lashgarkash’ (war leader) and was, to boot, a poet par excellence. Such an accomplished female ruler would have been a refreshing and inspiring example for students, otherwise fed only on the feats of male rulers.

When Mughal emperor Jahangir’s health deteriorated, his wife Nur Jahan effectively ruled from 1621–27 CE. During this time, she controlled the muhr uzuk (royal stamp of the Mughal rulers), passed firmaans (royal orders), issued a set of coins bearing her name alongside the emperor’s, freed her husband from the clutches of the recalcitrant noble Mahabat Khan and patronised an array of stunning buildings and sarai (rest houses) in Delhi and Agra.

Many sartorial innovations such as the dudami (a lady’s gown), panchtoliya (a lighter version of the odhani), baadla (silver brocade), kinari (silver lace) are all attributed to Nur Jahan who was also an excellent hunter.

Women are usually absent from the chronicles of history; to remove the examples that do exist is a grave injustice. By excising the histories of powerful women like Raziya Sultan and Nur Jahan, NCERT has missed an excellent opportunity to teach students the ways in which women negotiated power relations and overcame the challenges of ruling over a male-dominated society.

Another missed opportunity has to do with understanding the politics behind the destruction of temples. As a regular feature of invasions in Indian history, this subject should have been taught in a detailed manner, citing examples of varied rulers and the multiple reasons for pulling down not just temples but also Buddhist monasteries and mosques.

Instead, the Class 8 textbook only discusses the razing of temples in the context of the Delhi Sultanate and the Mughal period. This gives students the incorrect and dangerous impression that only the Delhi Sultanate and Mughals destroyed temples.

Examples to the contrary abound: the looting of 64 temples by the 9th-century ruler of Kashmir, Shankarvarman; the wanton burning of Jyendravihara, a Buddhist monastery in Kashmir by the 10th-century ruler Kshemagupta; the destruction of several Jain temples in Pulikara Nagara (a town in Karnataka) by Rajendra Chola in the 11th century after defeating the Chalukya ruler Someshavara I; the indiscriminate destruction of temple idols by King Harsha of Kashmir, also in the 11th century.

By choosing not to include them, the NCERT has chosen to ignore the fact that these events occurred across affiliations, that places of worship were attacked for political and financial reasons as much as on account of religious rivalries. This omission robs students of essential historical perspective on a complex and sensitive subject that is usually communalised in the public sphere.

With the NCERT characterising Mughal rulers as ‘brutal’ and ‘cruel’ (thereby attaching value judgements), the choice to present the topic of temple destruction as a Sultanate–Mughal policy seems a deliberate one. The NCERT deliberately wants students of Class 8 to believe that Sultans and Mughals were the only brutal and cruel destroyers of temples. This is the reason why the Maratha brutality in Bengal (1741–51 CE) has also been omitted from NCERT’s Class 8 history textbook.

The Maratha campaigns in Bengal were marked by all kinds of atrocities, including looting and plundering that led to the pauperisation of the Bengali peasant.

This is remembered even today in a centuries-old Bengali rhyme (with certain variations down the ages) — ‘Chhele ghumalo, paada judalo/ borgi elo deshe’ — which laments how the bargi (Maratha invader) came in the dead of night, took Bengal’s riches away and left peasants no money to pay taxes. The NCERT does not characterise the Maratha rulers as ‘cruel’ or ‘brutal’ — such judgement is reserved only for the Muslim rulers.

Similar instances of brutality against civilians are mentioned with pride by Rajendra Chola in his 11th-century Karandai Prashasti (eulogy) which heaps praises on the king for defeating the Chalukyas and burning their capital Manyakheta — an incident in which many women and children also died.

Such instances are absent from the new textbooks. As a result, the young student’s mind holds the ahistorical perception that only Muslim rulers practised atrocities in times of war, when the facts show that violence and coercion were the norm across monarchies in Indian history.

Even contemporary instances of violence such as the Partition riots, the demolition of the Babri Masjid, the 1992 riots and the Godhra riots of 2002 have been removed from the NCERT textbooks for Classes 11 and 12.

By omitting specific instances of violence, by erasing the histories of powerful women, by introducing preconceived communal notions vis-à-vis the Muslim rulers, by obliterating facts and moving away from established academic research, the NCERT reveals what it wants to do. Instead of shaping textbooks as tools that encourage critical thinking and historical analysis, it wants to use textbooks as tools to spread the ideology of its members — 24 of whom have direct links with the RSS.

Ruchika Sharma is a Delhi-based historian and professor