Former President of Shiksha Sanskriti Utthan Nyas, Convener of Shiksha Bachao Andolan, Former General Secretary of Vidya Bharati Akhil Bharatiya Shiksha Sansthan and renowned educationist Dinanath ji Batra passed away in Delhi on November 7, 2024. On one hand, he had the ascetic attitude of non-possessiveness, devotion to his goal, discipline, and on the other hand, he had the amazing courage and unwavering resolve to struggle and strive for his goal. Therefore, the adjective of warrior-ascetic will be most appropriate for him. His entire life was full of sacrifice, sadhana and struggle. Initially, he was also a ‘Sangh Pracharak’ for a few years. Even after entering the household life, like the service-devoted Pracharak of the Sangh, his life-motto remained “Tera Tujhko Arpan”.
He kept working day and night and tirelessly for the society and the nation till the last moment of his life. Due to the values he received in the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, the feeling of doing something good, beautiful and meaningful for the society and the nation that had been growing in his mind since his student days, became more firm and powerful with the passage of time. He himself had faced the horror of partition. Due to partition, he had to leave his birthplace Dera Ghazi Khan (now Pakistan) along with his family and come to India. He was not only a victim or a mute spectator of the difficult and dreadful circumstances faced by Hindus due to partition, but he also contributed directly in bringing the Hindus, victims of rioters, from Pakistan to India safely and in their rehabilitation etc. Through this medium, his knowledge reached the entire country.
His experiments in the field of education were fully successful and appreciated and were adopted in Vidya Bharati as well as other government and non-government schools. It would not be inappropriate to say that away from the commercial race and economic competition, Vidya Bharati stands today on a high and excellent ideological foundation, in its background are the personalities like Bhaurao Deoras, Krishnachandra Gandhi, Lajjaram Tomar, Brahmadev Sharma, Dinanath Batra, The sadhana and thought-vision of many sadhaks have been acting as a strong foundation. Otherwise, amidst the storm of materialism imported from the West, the breeze of bad culture arising from cinema, television and OTT, and the alien ideology nurtured by the mental children of Marx-Macaulay, it was not easy and possible for a sacred educational campaign and ritual like Vidya Bharati to progress and get widespread support from the society. He also played an important and leading role in realizing the concept of Shiksha Sanskriti Utthan Nyas and expanding its work and organization. He was the pioneer of the ‘Shiksha Bachao Andolan’.
Dinanath Batra was a strong supporter and advocate of India and Indianness. Being a supporter or advocating is one thing, but continuously studying, researching, writing and reading for the cause you are supporting and, if needed, taking to the streets and agitating for it or knocking the doors of the court is another thing. When we see intellectuals bowing down, compromising or changing sides due to petty selfishness, temptations, allurement of honours and awards, pressure from police-administration and autocratic powers and clash of egos, then the importance and specialty of a goal-oriented warrior like Batra ji becomes clear. He had the capability to fight and clash with the biggest powers for his goal and resolution. He never had the feeling of compromising or coordinating with the power establishments by keeping ideology aside, nor was the selective-convenient neutrality found in intellectuals seen in him after reaching the peak of fame. Despite giving top priority to organisational skill of taking everyone along and thinking about the welfare of the workers, he never let the philosophy of truth go out of his sight.
His courage was so strong that on 30 May 2001, he sent a notice to the then Congress President Sonia Gandhi and strongly demanded the removal of the adverse, insulting and negative remarks made against Vidya Bharati in the resolution passed in the National Convention of Congress. With all the authentic facts, arguments and evidences, he proved baseless the allegation made by the Congress that “Vidya Bharati’s textbooks have a negative attitude towards the minorities and they justify the caste system, Sati Pratha and child marriage.” Congress had no concrete answer to his irrefutable arguments, authentic facts and abundant evidences etc. In 2006, he filed a PIL and raised 70 objections to the material published in NCERT’s Social Science and History textbooks. The legitimacy and basis of those objections can be gauged from the fact that some of those materials even described Lala Lajpat Rai, Bal Gangadhar Tilak, Bipin Chandra Pal, Aurobindo Ghosh and Bhagat Singh as ‘extremists’ and even described Brahmins and Aryans as beef eaters in ancient times. Batra ji proved with evidence that these were fabricated, false and misleading things and had nothing to do with historical facts.
It was the result of his insistence, struggle and efforts for intellectual truth that the Delhi High Court took cognizance of his objections and directed NCERT to form a committee to study these objections. When the market forces and their intellectual supporters in disguise raised the demand to make sex education compulsory at school level in the entire country with the aim of promoting sexuality and hedonistic tendencies, Dinanath Batra was the main person to understand its ill-effects and potential dangers on Indian society. It was because of his logical resistance that some state governments refused to make sex education compulsory at school level in their states. In 2008, he filed a petition in the Delhi High Court on behalf of the Shiksha Bachao Andolan demanding the removal of AK Ramanujan’s essay “Three Hundred Ramayanas: Five Examples and Three Thoughts on Translation” from the history syllabus of Delhi University, as a result of which the said essay was removed from the syllabus by the Academic Council of the University in 2011. On March 3, 2010, he sent a legal warning to Wendy Doniger, Penguin Group, USA and Penguin India, a subsidiary of the company, raising several objections to the contents of ‘The Hindus: An Alternative History.’ When his objections were not taken cognizance of, in 2011 he filed a case against Doniger and Penguin Publications under Section 295A of the Indian Penal Code for intentionally insulting and hurting the feelings of religious communities.
Eventually, in February 2014, Penguin India was forced to withdraw all printed copies of the book and destroy the unsold copies. In 2011 itself, he sent a legal warning to N. Ram, the editor of the leftist inspired magazine ‘The Frontline’ for publishing a cover story titled ‘Shortcut to Hindu Rashtra’. In the great tradition of India, death of a person is not considered an occasion to express ideological differences or opposition, etc. But the irritation or hatred of ‘The Frontline’ magazine towards Dinanath Batra can be gauged from the fact that just two days after his death, an article titled “Dinanath Batra: The Educationist Who Waged War Against Knowledge” was published in it. Even after his death, this magazine did not hesitate in spewing venom against him. He sent a legal notice to Aleph Book Company for another book of Wendy Doniger, ‘On Hinduism’, to Megha Kumar’s book ‘Communalism and Sexual Violence: Since Ahmedabad 1969’ and to Orient Blackswan for Shekhar Bandyopadhyay’s book ‘From Plassey to Partition: A History of Modern India’. While on one hand, his efforts brought widespread awareness among the general public about the preservation and maintenance of Hindu religion and Sanatan culture, on the other hand, it also sent a message to anti-national and anti-Sanatan forces that they may have to face legal action for presenting factless and baseless material. Just think how vigilant and cautious his eye must have been on the anti-Sanatan intellectual forces and activities and how strong his moral strength must have been that he alone kept fighting against those powerful organizations and resource-rich publishers and kept a check on their arbitrariness and autocracy to a certain extent. After his great departure, it will be very appropriate to think that to what extent and how much success was achieved in establishing the values, ideas and ideals in education for which a warrior-ascetic like Dinanath Batra struggled throughout his life? Has there been any significant progress in the direction of Indianization of education and curriculum change or is its pace very slow and sluggish? It is heartening that on the strength of the continuous thinking, study, experience, effort and hard work of many educationists like Batra ji, the country has got a revolutionary policy like National Education Policy – 2020, but is the speed and direction of its implementation satisfactory? A real, authentic and comprehensive answer to all such questions will be a true tribute to Batra ji from the grateful nation.
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