Exordium
We all know that Genghis Khan invaded China, plundered and pulverised it to pieces for seven decades during 1205 to 1279 and that Julius Caesar invaded Britain and enslaved it twice in 55 and 54 B.C. But, if we look at the history text books of China or Britain, we will not find a single mention of those events. The logic is simple. They do not want their children to be fed with defeatist narrations during their formative years. Later of course, when they grow up into matured adults, they may get all these data from various sources. But as a fledgling student they are confined only to success stories of the past history of their nation to ensure that they develop a sense of pride and patriotism and with that objective in mind all negative data are scrupulously screened off in their schools.
Juxtapose this with the contents of the textbooks in our schools. What a stark contrast! Every page, every sentence shamelessly lionises with laurels the glory and grandeur of the invaders, plunderers, bandits, ravagers from foreign land in inflated superlatives while our natives are presented as powerless paralysed lot in a pitiful, pathetic picture. The tiny tots in our schools are taught that only the westerners are strong, superior, sturdy and supreme, that they only brought us civilisation, education, mathematics, modern science, social structure etc. and that but for them we would have continued to be brutes and barbarians loitering in jungles. It is a pity that even after getting freedom, for several decades we have been continuing to feed our children with such absolutely false, gloomy, negative, defeatist narration as a result of which the society as a whole had developed an indelible inferiority complex and consequently, for every concept of our ancient wisdom, we tend to seek proof of validity from the west and solicit their approval.
In this context, therefore, the news item that at last our school text books are going to be revised, mending the mendacities deliberately done with devilish design by the left-wing anti-national pseudo-historians, is most welcome and in this context, we can offer a few suggestions for consideration. They are listed below and the last one is the most vital one.
Broad Outline Of Suggestions
Elaborate coverage of mighty empires like Guptas, Pallava, Haryanka, Shishunga, Nanda, Maurya, Gupta, Chalukya, Vijayanagara, Chola, Pandiya, Chera, Pallava etc. [incidentally, how many of them we are aware of at present?] should replace the present panegyrics on Mughal and British empires. The unique features of each dynasty and the manner in which our Bharat varsha flourished earlier in multifarious fields should be comprehensively covered. The glorious tributes by foreign visitors like Megasthenes [Indica], Hiuen Tsang, Marco Polo, Faxian etc. should be included in the studies.
For instance, just one quote, a golden tribute by a visitor:
Hiuen Tsang wrote about the religious condition of India as well. He described that Brahamanism, Buddhism and Jainism were all popular religions in India. There was complete tolerance among people of all religious faiths and people changed their religions voluntarily.
Now, coming to the moghul dynasty, there were several warriors both men and women in Maratha, Rajput, Ahom, Sikh, Keladi dynasties who had successfully thwarted the invaders. There were a few queens like Tara Bai, Rani Chennamma who were nightmares for Aurangzeb! There was one Bappa Rawal who invaded the Arab countries, smashed all the enemies and marched majestically as far as the banks of Euphrates river in Central Asia, converting Muslims to Hindus in his conquest! These names are just a few. Many such spectacular feats of victorious warriors are either completely concealed or casually mentioned as a minor footnote in passing. Instead of highlighting such splendid successes, our books glorify the greatness of Akbar[!], architecture of Taj mahal, austerity of Aurangzeb!! What a pity!
The narrations on the advent of East India Company, the subsequent British rule and our freedom struggle thereof are all fundamentally faulty and require radical revision. In this task, patriotic historians and not the pseudo anti-national communists should be involved in rewriting the script. The fictitious fantasy of featuring Gandhi-Nehru narration as the fulcrum of freedom fight should be replaced by the real, resolute revolutionaries who have sacrificed their limbs and lives for the love of their motherland. The actual reasons that compelled the Britain to leave should be precisely disclosed.
One vital aspect in the design of the books is this: The student in Kollam or Kanyakumari should be thorough with the heroics of Lachit Borbhukan and Tara Bai while his counterpart in Pathankot or Kashipur should know in detail about the sacrifices of Neelaknata Brahmachari and Kittoor Chennamma. The contents should be framed in such a way as to instill a Bharatiya perspective and not any parochial predilection.
Students should also be encouraged with incentives to learn as many Indian languages as possible and for that avenues for facilitating such endeavour should be created in all states.
Patriotic spirit and national identity should be the core criterion.
Coming to other subjects, while discussing Mathematics, Astronomy, Physics, Medicine etc. the original contributions of our ancient scholars like Aryabhatta, Varahamihira, Bhaskara, Charaka, Shushruta, Brahmagupta, Vachaspati Mishra etc. should be highlighted. Our Vedic texts have abundant information about many aspects of modern science. For instance, our Aruna Parshnam in Krishna Yajurveda-Taittireeya Aranyakam describes the cosmos and the solar system in great detail. Our vedas contain astonishing wealth of information on many aspects of life. We can solicit the assistance of vedic scholars available now and incorporate such details in our textbooks.
Samskritam [let us call it in its correct name and not as the anglicised one-Sanskrit. In fact, the meaning of the name itself is ‘perfectly created’!] should be made compulsory in all schools, inasmuch as that language, by its unique nature, inculcates a sense of satvic psyche and promotes not a mere national outlook but an extensive global vision.
And, here is the last one, the climax:
The most invidious and insidious instance is our Tamil textbooks in the schools of Tamil Nadu. Anybody going through the text of any class will start wondering whether he is reading a school textbook or a dravidian propaganda booklet. The contents of a school textbook should be designed to reflect the beliefs and values cherished by the majority of the state and not those of a miniscule motely of misguided heretics. The teachers in the school and the parents at home, who, more often than not belong to the bulk holding conventional convictions antithetical to the postulates of the book, are finding it quite exasperating while explaining the contents to the neophyte.
In fact, the design and definition of the contents of a textbook should be on a stricter criteria. The young lad is in his formative stage when he accepts ipso facto as ‘veda vakku’ every statement articulated by his teacher and every word written in his book. He is like a child holding his mother’s hand under the infallible impression that she will lead him in the right path. Later of course, when he grows up, leaves his alma mater, enters the amphitheatre of life, encounters different experiences, he develops the faculty of discrimination and can independently judge any book, any person or any situation. It is then the sacred duty of the academic world to equip him with skills to take proper judgement beneficial to the society.
In the good old days, that is, before the advent of the dravidian regime, we used to have topics like the following in our textbooks:
கடவுள் வாழ்த்து, நாலடியார், ஆத்திசூடி, கொன்றை வேந்தன், மூதுரை, நல்வழி, திரிகடுகம், ஆசாரக்கோவை, பழமொழி நானூறு, சிறுபஞ்சமூலம் போன்ற நீதி நூல்கள்
[These are all poems couched in simple diction providing proper guidance to the student to lead a life of lofty, laudable principles.]
Portions from literature like கம்ப ராமாயணம், சங்க இலக்கியங்கள்,
Prose writing by great authors like உ.வே.சா, டாக்டர் மு.வ.,
The focus of the entire exercise is to inculcate in the nascent mind of the ward lofty ideals, patriotic spirit, universal outlook, proclivity for philanthropy so as to equip him to lead a laudable life and transform him into a responsible citizen selflessly contributing his services for nation building and making the globe a better place for living.
But, instead, what we find in the books is a wily, subtle attempt to project the Tamil race as something distinct from the rest of the nation. This feature may not be discernable on a cursory glance but indirectly injected in various ways. The four southern languages are grouped into a separate family quite different from other dialects. Excessive encomium is showered on western personalities like Caldwell, Max Mueller, William Jones, G U Pope etc. who under the garb of developing local languages were indulging in conversion activities. At the same time, miniscule mention is made about noble indigenous persons like U.V Swaminatha Iyer, Va.Ve.Su.Iyer, Paridhimarkalaigner, Devaneya Pavanar, Ka. Appatthurayar, just to mention a few.
On the other hand, Karunanidhi’s life, political life and his “artistic contributions” has been included in the recently released textbooks of the Tamil Nadu Government.
While his distinctive contribution in film dialogue writing during the 60’s, with powerful, poignant and passionate phrases propelling the viewer to obstreperous response need not be denied, there are plenty of other grey aspects even bordering on darkness in his career that portray him as a controversial figure unfit to find a place in a school textbook. He is, no doubt, deified as a demigod by the dravidian denomination but equally disliked and detested by a devout section of the people.
Here are a few other articles open to criticism.
Class 9:
Chapter 6.2 இராவண காவியம் Epic on Ravana
Chapter 8.1 : பெரியாரின் சிந்தனைகள் Gems of thought from Periar.
[A detailed article on these appeared in The Commune magazine on April 4, 2024.]
There are even essays on prominent persons like M G Ramachandran, Iyothee dasar, etc. who have no doubt, strong following from many quarters but who are not universally accepted by all sections of the society and therefore may not conform to the strict criteria for inclusion in school textbooks.
Epilogue
We have, for brevity’s sake, focussed only on two subjects in detail, history and Tamil books. Similar changes can be done in other areas also like Mathematics, Sciences, Social studies, Astronomy, Medicine etc. after consultations with specialists in the respective fields. Changes are also required in the reward and punishment system where automatic pass in all classes is eschewed and instead, a system to strictly assess what has been assimilated and absorbed by the pupil is introduced, so that corrective action can be promptly initiated at each stage.
In short, our education system should regain its past glory to such an extent that it should attract students from all over the world, analogous to our ancient universities like Taxila, Nalanda, Varanasi, Kashmir, Kanchi etc. where abecedarians from all countries, irrespective of caste, religion, nationality thronged in thousands for free education with boarding and lodging!
Our aim should be to develop a contributive youth force into a collective, constructive, cooperative cordial society. If we start the exercise now itself we can reap the fruits through our future generation and our nation will shine as the foremost ‘VISHVAGURU’ for the entire human race.
Parasuram Sharma is a retired bank officer and an octogenarian whose interests include Sanathana Dharmam, Samskritam, history and politics.
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