A high-level committee for Social Sciences, constituted by the National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT) to revise the school curriculum has come up with a new recommendation: "India" should be replaced with "Bharat" in the school textbooks for all classes.
According to CI Isaac, Committee Chairperson, the panel has also suggested introducing "classical history" instead of "ancient history" in the curriculum and including the Indian Knowledge System (IKS) in the syllabus for all subjects. Further, the committee has recommended highlighting "Hindu victories" in various battles in the textbooks, as per a report by PTI.
"Our failures are presently mentioned in the textbooks. But our victories over the Mughals and sultans are not," said Isaac, who is also a member of the Indian Council of Historical Research (ICHR).
The NCERT is revising the curriculum of the school textbooks in line with the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020. The council recently constituted a 19-member National Syllabus and Teaching Learning Material Committee (NSTC) to finalise the curriculum, textbooks and learning material for these classes.
Besides Issac, other members of the committee include ICHR Chairperson Raghuvendra Tanwar; Vandana Mishra, Professor, Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU); Vasant Shinde, former vice-chancellor of the Deccan College Deemed University, and Mamta Yadav, who teaches Sociology in a Haryana government school.
NCERT officials, however, said no decision has been taken yet on the panel's recommendations, as per PTI.
