Marxist to Hindutva: How NCERT history book rows mirror a battle for India’s past

The recently released NCERT Class 9 social science textbook, Understanding Society – India and Beyond, has stirred controversy with its perspective on medieval history. In a chapter discussing medieval history, the textbook focuses on the resistance offered by local kings to "foreign invaders," namely the Delhi Sultans and the Mughals, while only briefly mentioning the alliance between the Mughals and Rajputs.

This shift in interpretation marks a departure from previous history textbooks, which often highlighted both instances of cooperation between Mughal invaders and Hindu rulers, as well as the development of a composite culture in India.

The revision of history in India began with the British after their conquest of the land. Historian Gyanendra Pandey has argued that British colonial historians categorized Indian history into Hindu India, Muslim India, and British India, viewing religion as the driving force in Indian history, in stark contrast to the modern, secular West. This perspective also legitimized British rule by portraying it as a means of "civilising" the native populations.

However, the nationalist discourse that emerged during the freedom struggle sought to reframe Hindus and Muslims as co-travelers in India's national journey, rather than adversaries. Historians such as Tara Chand, Jawaharlal Nehru, and Lala Lajpat Rai contributed to this revisionist narrative, portraying Muslims as Indian by birth, marriage, and death.

Indira Gandhi's shift towards the Left in the 1960s, marked by policies such as bank nationalisation and poverty eradication, further solidified this perspective, leading to a broader acceptance of a composite cultural history in India.