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The National Council for Education Research and Training (NCERT) has revised the syllabus for class 12, History. From the academic year 2023-24 students will not have chapters pertaining to the ‘Mughal Empire’ in India.
Apart from the class 12 syllabus, the NCERT dropped specific chapters from the textbooks of class 10 and 11 history and political science books.
This includes changes in the ‘Democratic Politics-II’ textbook for Class 10. With the removal of chapters on ‘Democracy and Diversity’, ‘Popular Struggles and Movements’, and ‘Challenges of Democracy’.
Class 11 textbook ‘Themes in World History’ will not have chapters like ‘Central Islamic Lands’, ‘Clash of Cultures’, and ‘Industrial Revolution’.
Notably, after the decision came out Bharatiya Janta Party (BJP) leader Kapil Mishra lauded the move saying ‘thieves’ were being referred to as ‘rulers’ and now the ‘truth’ will be taught.
Retweeting a video about the revised textbook news, he wrote, “It is a great decision to remove false history of Mughals from NCERT. Thieves, pickpockets and two-penny road raiders were called the Mughal Sultanate and the emperor of India. Akbar, Babar, Shahjahan, Aurangzeb are not in the history books, they are in the dustbin.”
As soon as the decision was issued by the board, the Uttar Pradesh government has implemented the changes.
The UP Board of Secondary Education (UP Board) has stated that the syllabus for classes 10th, 11th, and 12th, which follow the NCERT curriculum, will be updated to reflect the recent changes.
Watch a detailed report on the revision made by NCERT here:
See how the people on social media react to this decision:
A verified Twitter user Swathi Bellam wrote, “Mughals have ruled India for 331 years with Akbar and Aurangzeb each ruling more than 50 years and one of largest ever empires in Indian history
So NCERT syllabus shouldn’t remove Mughal history from history books
In fact they must tell the real story of how atrocious and disastrous was Mughal rule for India
1. Akbar kept 68 % of all the taxes collected for himself and nearly 90 % of all the taxes collected went into coffers of Akbar & his 1000 nobel men. And so only 10 % for rest of the countrymen
2. Akbar hoarded so much of gold by collecting it from people that once during festivities there was a fire and gold melted and flew on the road from his Khazana but he said don’t stop festivities let it continue
3. During Shahjahan ere there was a devastating decade long famine in Deccan and Saurashtra where 30 lakhs people died in starvation. People sold their children for a bowl of rice and ate their dead parents. And great lover boy shahjahan gave a princely sum of ₹5000 per month for 20 month for welfare while his wife’s makeup expenses were money was 10,00,000₹
If such great things are told in textbooks then future generations will know what happens when bharat loses to invaders” she added.
A writer, Smita Barooah wrote, “Please note:
Removing a few chapters ≠ erasing Mughal history.
Reducing some content to make space for other information ≠ erasing Mughal history.
What is the actual situation? Check before building a whole story on hearsay. Wait. Verify. Then outrage if it is merited”
Another verified Twitter user Arun Pundur wrote, “NCERT removes chapters on Mughals from textbooks. Invader Tyrant Mughals purged and flushed down the as they should be. 75 years after Independence Modi Govt’s will include details of real History Hindu Kingdoms who contributed to Bharat.”
“India is probably the only country that had history books glorifying Islamic and Christian invaders and completely suppressed great Hindu empires and their contributions.
British stooges CONgis used Mullah-Missionary-Marxists to destroy the truth and spread fake history” he added.
While many appreciated the move some questioned it calling it a ‘Bigot’ move.
Leader Babul Supriyo wrote, “What a shame !! Hon’ble Prime Minister will deliver his speech from Red Fort but NCERT will remove/slowly diminish ‘Mughal History’ from school text books• Shocking !!! @AITCofficial How can @BJP4India distort history having accused @INCIndia of committing the same ‘crime’?”
AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi said while the Modi government is erasing the Mughal history from textbooks, China is deleting the present of India.
Audrey Truschke, self-described historian wrote, “Somewhere in the Hindutva universe, this is going to end with the Marathas fighting the Rajput Empire, right? #history #Hindutva.”
A verified Twitter user mocked Rajputs and wrote, “Since Rajputs were always losing wars, they built this to hide from people they were repeatedly losing from”
Another verified twitter user wrote, After removing Mughals from textbooks, teaching History will be weird. Like, Rajputs fought a war with nobody and lost.
Notably, following the social media war a statement by the director of NCERT, Dinesh Prasad Saklani came in stating the board is not erasing the history from 1526 to 1857, they are just dropping some chapters which will have no affect on the knowledge of the students.
As quoted by news agency ANI, Saklani said, “It’s a lie. (Chapters on) Mughals have not been dropped. There was a rationalisation process last year because due to COVID, there was pressure on students everywhere…Expert committees examined the books from std 6-12. They recommended that if this chapter is dropped, it won’t affect the knowledge of the children and an unnecessary burden can be removed…The debate is unnecessary. Those who don’t know, can check the textbooks…”
“We are working as per NEP (National Education Policy) 2020. This is a transition phase. NEP 2020 speaks of reducing the content load. We are implementing it. NCF (National Curriculum Framework) for school education is being formed, it will be finalised soon. Textbooks will be printed in 2024 as per NEP. We have not dropped anything right now” he concluded.
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