A debate has been triggered over NCERT's new Class 8 textbook, which mentioned Akbar's regime was a blend of "brutality" and "tolerance", Babur a "ruthless conqueror" while Aurangzeb was a "military ruler" who reimposed taxes on non-Muslims.
00:00And a short while ago, the NCRT has released a statement saying class 8 being the last year of the middle stages,
00:06the students are expected to acquire broad multi-disciplinary perspective and understanding of our past between 13th to mid-19th century.
00:14NCRT textbook shows how the various events of that period have helped to shape and influence the evolution of India of today.
00:20All the facts presented in this textbook are based on well-known primary and secondary academic sources.
00:24However, in order to avoid generation of any prejudice and understanding, a note on history's darker period has been added for the benefit of the learners.
00:34Is politics dictating school syllabi? Is this an attempt to villainize the Mughals?
00:39Or is this course correction by the NCRT? Those are the questions I want to raise.
00:45Short face-off, Ruchika Sharma is a historian on medieval Indian history.
00:50Ratan Sharda is author, also closely associated with the RSS.
00:54I appreciate both of you joining us.
00:57Ruchika, your first reactions to these NCRT textbooks.
01:01Is this course correction trying to project an objective view of Akbar and Babar,
01:07pointing out the darker sides or darker shades of their rule?
01:11First of all, I think there was a time when there were NCRT books which said that the term dark period or dark ages in history is a historical term.
01:22It's kind of sad to see that today that entire term has made it back to the NCRT and is being used as an objective term.
01:30As if classifying certain acts in history as dark or classifying certain periods in history as dark is a very historical thing to do.
01:40Academically, these are terms which have been completely debunked.
01:45And we've said that these are terms which are not to be used because they create this idea that somehow there are golden periods, quote-unquote,
01:52and darker periods, which creates this comparison which cannot be done because there are different historical contexts for different time periods.
02:00So this comparison across time periods of dark and gold anyway is very ahistorical and it's sad to see that NCRT is resorting to this.
02:08The other important point over here is that the recent changes in the NCRT 8th class textbooks, a lot of it are factually incorrect.
02:15For example, there is this particular bit where they say that the Jizia was brought as a tax to incentivize the non-Muslims to convert to Islam in order to stop paying the Jizia.
02:27Which primary source is the NCRT referring to?
02:30Firstly, the NCRT doesn't tell us that.
02:33But also, if it does, I would really like to file an RTI and try and understand which source, whether it's during Akbar's time, before Akbar's time, after Akbar's time,
02:44or, you know, any time in the Islamic world when Jizia is first instituted or, you know, goes on being instituted, where is this source coming from?
02:53There is literally no primary source that says that.
02:55Then it goes on to say that Akbar abolished Jizia much later in his reign, which is again incorrect.
03:011560 is when Akbar's reign starts.
03:041562 is when he abolishes Jizia.
03:06That is not much later.
03:08This is a man with 45 years of rule.
03:10So, if you really want to talk about, you know, much later, it should ideally be 30 years into his rule or something.
03:15Right?
03:15Okay.
03:16So, the NCRT is blatantly denying.
03:18I take your point.
03:19I take your larger point.
03:20You're claiming if you're going by primary sources, as students should be taught based on primary sources, then those primary sources should be cited.
03:28Ratan Sharda, how do you respond?
03:30Do you believe this is course correction?
03:32When it is suggested, for example, that the barbarity of Babar or the acts of oppression of Akbar are also highlighted, do you believe this is course correction and objective history or a Saffronized history?
03:49Ratan Sharda, good evening, you know very well that the history was rewritten with so-called scientific terminology somewhere in 1990s by the Aligarh school and JNU historians who believed that we should whitewash the history and present an amiable form of history which will try to disown the atrocities of invaders.
04:11Why are you focusing on Akbar?
04:13Okay, if you focus on Akbar, Akbar, the most interesting part is that Akbar, there are two so-called great kings by the earlier historians.
04:22One is Akbar the Great, second is Ashoka the Great.
04:25They were the only two kings who had a theocratic state.
04:30Akbar had his Dene Elahi, Ashoka had his Buddhism and both had huge history of atrocities which were sought to be softened
04:41by historians, I don't know why.
04:43But no one mentions, no one mentions, sir, in this book, the atrocities of Ashoka.
04:48No one will mention what happened during Kalinga.
04:50Corrections can happen, but what I am saying is, when you people start creating this controversy around the history, history was never balanced.
05:00Where did I read about the Cholas and the Pandeyans?
05:03Cholas lasted from 300 BC to 1300, I think 13 BC.
05:08You had Aham Kingdom for hundreds of years.
05:11You had Vijayanagara for nearly 300 years.
05:15What was Mughal period?
05:16The peak of Mughal period was 150 to 200 years.
05:19We talk of Mughal period, do we talk of the resistance given by the Hindus?
05:23That is the only reason Hindus survived.
05:25Every other community vanished from where the Islamic conquest came.
05:28No, we don't talk about that.
05:30So Aryan-Indian theory, it was put to our head that we are all outsiders.
05:36We were one of the parts of the karma that returned coming to India and we can invade and state there.
05:42But that has been falsified.
05:44So now it is called Aryan migration theory.
05:46So can we at least now if people like Thapar has come back to say ATI is wrong, AIT is wrong, but Aryan migration is better.
05:54So that means there is always scope for people to look at the history.
05:58And what is the history that NCRD is saying?
06:00That history which has been said by Jaduna Sarkar, Aasi, Majumdar before Marxist talk over.
06:06And what was the ground for these historians, the Mughal historians who chronicled the lives of Babur, of Akbar, Aurangzee and everybody?
06:14Are we going to deny that?
06:16So this horrid past of Akbar that 30,000 people are put to sword.
06:20Sir, the same rules will have to be applied for all rulers, most of whom were conquerors.
06:27And you will have to look at history in a much more complex manner, not in a black and white of villains and heroes.
06:32That's the only point.
06:33But Ruchika, you want to respond?
06:35Because what Ratan Sharada says is an argument made by many right-wingers that history was driven by the Marxists
06:41and therefore they highlighted Akbar the Great as some kind of a secular ideal,
06:47glossing over perhaps some of the barbarities that were also committed in the course of his conquest.
06:54Absolutely.
06:55There are a couple of things that Mr. Sharada mentioned that I want to respond to.
06:58Firstly, the fact that the Cholas had an uninterrupted rule from 3000 BCE all the way to 1300 AD is absolutely incorrect.
07:05There were three different types of Cholas who ruled in different regions.
07:09They are not one.
07:11And each of them had probably 100.
07:14300 BCE is not where the Cholas start.
07:17I'll just take a moment.
07:18First century AD all the way to third century AD is the first time the Cholas rule.
07:23Then they are, then that's a different Cholas.
07:25Then of course, there is around 5th century to 6th century AD, that's a different Cholas.
07:30And then the Great Cholas come in, which come in from 9th century, which is very much taught.
07:35In fact, even the Sangam Cholas, the 1st century AD Cholas are taught.
07:39So both the Cholas are taught.
07:40But what we are not taught, and this is what I'm coming to, is for example, when the Chola rulers are attacking the Chalukya rulers, right, in around 1042 AD, they break a host of Jain temples and burn this entire town called Kolipakkai.
07:57This is something that is not mentioned.
07:59And this somehow does not for the NCRT qualify as something which is bad enough to label the Cholas as brutal rulers or as cruel rulers.
08:08However, Akbar and his siege of Chittor is reason enough, in this man's 45 years of reign, one instance, to call him a brutal ruler.
08:18However, we don't apply the same standards to the Cholas.
08:21So I don't understand why there are these double standards.
08:24Ruchika, I've just got a minute.
08:27We'll try and do a wider debate.
08:28But I think I take your point, the double standards that you believe that exist in the way these books are being written.
08:33In Ratan Sharada, 30 seconds, you want to respond to that because surely students deserve, nobody denies that, a more complex reading of history.
08:41But these books seem to reduce it to a very simplified version of history.
08:46There are enough Hindu rulers, the Cholas were also just now cited, who've also resorted to brutality.
08:51They were conquerors, they were expanding their kingdoms.
08:54Why are we only down, we seem to have gone by, you know, to the point of only villainizing the Mughals?
09:00Well, Rajdeep, at least people of your kind and the historian have agreed that there are stories that are Hindus.
09:06The dark period, the talk of millions of Hindus perished and thousands of temples were destroyed because they were bigots, because they were non-believers, they were kafirs.
09:16Is it not written by the chroniclers of the Mughal rulers?
09:19So what happens to Hindu rulers who destroyed Tupas?
09:22I am happy that you have come to the stage, we are ready to say that history is complex.
09:28It has to be read from both the sides and do not believe in monochrome history that the Marxists have thrown at us all these years.
09:34At least you are clear to that, I am very happy on that.
09:37Okay, let me leave it there.
09:38Hopefully, our students will get to read a history that is far more complex than these NCRT textbooks at the moment seem to suggest.
09:48But we need a wider debate on this and I am glad at least that the debate has been triggered off.
09:52Ratan Sharda and Ruchika appreciate your joining us.
