NCERT row: IIT-Gandhinagar to review Danino's guest faculty role after SC directive

IIT-Gandhinagar will review historian Michel Danino’s role as a guest professor after the Supreme Court, in a case it has been actively pursuing for weeks over a withdrawn NCERT (National Council of Educational Research and Training) textbook chapter on judicial corruption, directed governments and public institutions to dissociate from him and two other academics involved in drafting it.

Officials said a standing committee at the institute will examine Danino’s association with IIT-Gandhinagar in view of the court’s latest directions, which extend beyond the textbook controversy to the professional affiliations of the academics linked to it.

“A standing committee will look into Danino's appointment in view of the Supreme Court's directions, and a decision will be taken after that,” a senior official privy to the development said.

The court’s order comes at the latest stage of an unusually intense proceeding that began late last month when the Supreme Court took suo motu cognisance of a chapter in an NCERT Class 8 social science textbook referring to corruption within the judiciary.

In the days that followed, the court directed that the textbook should not be circulated and sought explanations from authorities. The NCERT subsequently withdrew the book and issued an apology, acknowledging an “error in judgement”.

Despite the withdrawal, the court has continued to hear the matter and expand its scope. On Wednesday, it directed the Centre and all state governments to disassociate themselves from the three experts involved in drafting the chapter.

Danino, a Padma Shri awardee, chaired the curricular area group responsible for developing social science textbooks for NCERT. Two other members of the drafting committee — Suparna Diwakar and Alok Prasanna Kumar — were also named in the court’s directions.

There was no response from Danino, Diwakar or Kumar to calls and text messages seeking comment.

Taking a stern view of the contents of the chapter, which it described as containing “offending” references to judicial corruption, the Supreme Court said the three individuals should no longer be associated with curriculum preparation.

A bench headed by Chief Justice of India Surya Kant said, “At the outset, we have no reason to doubt that professor Michel Danino and his associates Suparna Diwakar and Alok Prasanna Kumar either do not have reasonable informed knowledge with respect to Indian judiciary or they deliberately and knowingly misrepresented the facts in order to project a negative image of Indian judiciary before the students of Class 8.”

The court added that it saw “no reason” why the three should be associated “in any manner” with the preparation of school curricula or the finalisation of textbooks for the next generation of children.

The direction has prompted scrutiny of Danino’s academic engagements beyond the NCERT exercise. He has been associated with IIT-Gandhinagar since 2011, when he began serving as a guest professor at the institute.

Born in France and now an Indian citizen, Danino was awarded the Padma Shri in 2017 for his contributions to literature and education. He was also a member of the Centre’s committee tasked with drafting a new curriculum framework under the National Education Policy, 2020.

Alok Prasanna Kumar is the co-founder of the Vidhi Centre for Legal Policy, while Suparna Diwakar is an educator who currently serves as a board member at the School of Inspired Leadership.

With PTI inputs