SAMAJ WEEKLY UK
Bal Ram Sampla
Geopolitics
Taking the French and Russian Revolutions out of Class IX deprives students of learning how ordinary people fought against systemic oppression.
The French Revolution taught the world about liberty, equality, and fighting against born privilege.
The Russian Revolution taught how working classes challenged economic injustice.
Removing these key events shields young minds from learning that unjust social orders can and should be challenged.
Sugarcoating the Caste System
The new textbook highlights that the ancient varna system began as a “flexible” division of labor, not a rigid birth-based caste system.
Focusing on an idealized origin story while downplaying the centuries of brutal caste discrimination that followed serves to sanitize history:
(1) Hides Systemic Oppression: It minimizes how caste turned into a rigid, violent system enforcing untouchability, social exclusion, and economic denial for millions.
(2) Shifts the Blame: Framing ancient social structures as naturally good implies that caste oppression was merely a late distortion,often blaming foreign invasions or colonial rule rather than indigenous social hierarchies.
(3) Erases Anti-Caste Heroes: When the harsh reality of caste is softened, the monumental struggles of anti-caste reformers like Savitribai Phule, Jyotirao Phule, and B.R. Ambedkar are stripped of their historical urgency.
The Goal: Building a Fake “Golden Age”
This shift aligns directly with Hindutva ideology, which seeks to present ancient India as a harmonious, conflict-free “Golden Age.”
To maintain this image, internal injustices like caste violence are sanitized, while global ideas of secular revolution and class struggle are discarded as foreign.
Conclusion
Teaching children that a deeply oppressive caste system started out as a harmless, flexible social order is not objective history, it is an defence of structural inequality. Replacing real history with sanitized myths prevents the next generation from recognising injustice and demanding true equality.
Reference
1.https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/ncert-delays-nazism-french-revolution-by-a-year-for-students/articleshow/131979601.cms?hl=en
2.https://www.indiaacademicfreedom.net/school-education/ncert-drops-french-russian-revolutions-from-class-ix-books?hl=en
3.https://www.tribuneindia.com/news/top-headlines/ncert-drops-french-russian-revolutions-from-class-ix-books/?hl=en-
