Needed: Watchdog to tackle political pressure at NCERT

If the recent move by the HRD Ministry to develop “institutional mechanisms” to address complaints on NCERT textbooks is to fructify, we are in danger of adding more red tape to our existing levels of bureaucracy in education.

As rightly pointed out in the story, the NCERT has mechanisms to address concerns through an internal committee and is subject to the RTI Act. What it does not have is a mechanism to tackle political pressure.

(Image Credit: http://visualwatchdog.com/)


To make this point clear, I looked at the complaints against the NCERT that have been covered by the media in the past.

In 2002, a pro-BJP slant was discovered in the textbooks. Then NCERT Director J.S.L Rajput was quoted in the Washington Post as saying history should be re-written from the Indian point of view. This piece explores in detail how textbooks in some states were biased as far back as the 1950s. It also spurned a sarcastic piece in the Business Standard about how easy it was to become an NCERT textbook writer.

In 2010, the much publicized Nisha Sharma dowry case (where she charged the groom Munish Dalal for asking dowry) was included in the textbook. Although the Courts acquitted Dalal and his family this year, neither politicians nor “authorities” show any signs of making amends.

The NDTV website recently hosted a set of cartoons whose worthiness the government is trying to evaluate, on the back of the furore caused by the cartoon featuring Ambedkar and Nehru.

Strangely all complaints covered in the media are in the domain of political science and history. There are no complaints in books pertaining to subjects such as English/ Hind or Science or Mathematics. Is it because “facts” accepted the world over cannot be contested? Is it because there is no political mileage to be derived by trashing Science or Mathematics books?

Complaints on the quality and availability of books get rare coverage in the media, perhaps as space fillers. Criticism or comparison on the content of textbooks is mainly on public websites such as this. Serious issues such as possible content pilferage are voiced on blogs.

If the NCERT were to develop guidelines to address complaints, it should perhaps start by publishing the list of complaints received monthly along with a description of the complaint, name of the complainant, redressal sought and action taken by NCERT. This list should be publicly accessible.

In case of any historically distorted facts, an “overwhelming sentiment” by the parliament alone should not suffice for carrying out a change. Opinions of a varied cross section of people, particularly children studying that course material and the communities/ entities affected by that content, should be sought. The people developing such content for NCERT or other affiliated bodies should be given a chance to validate their rationale for including such content.

For the government, making changes to textbooks might seem a victory, but for academics who have built a reputation painstakingly doing research and developing textbooks, it is a dent to their credibility.

(I wrote this post for the Hoot blog. Click here to visit the site)

Office-Office: Need to Know

(Picture Source: http://www.dilbert.com/)

Open the newspaper and the front page has a story with a photo of your boss. For a second you are elated (“the man is dead and so are my worries”) , but then reality dawns and a tinge of sadness fills you (“Had I completed the report, he would have died slightly happy”). Wait a second, what’s this – boss is not dead. He has moved firms!

Gosh! Why didn’t he tell you? (At least you could have had a peaceful night’s sleep and actaully looked forward to tomorrow). Because you did not need to know.

Wide eyed wonder works all the time on a presentation that she thinks is her original effort. But just like the good Samaritan of the movies who gets killed by the villain before intermission, she is rudely emailed a similar PPT and asked to re-work and submit this instead of her work. She has 30 minutes to do this. Worse still, she has no clue that what she is going to work on has been deemed “trash” by another team last quarter.

So why does she have to use this PPT and not her original work? She is not told as she does not “need to know”. Why was this PPT not shared earlier? No need to know. Where will this PPT be used? She will be told on need to know basis.

This is a phrase barely mentioned in any induction program – that all information sharing will happen on “Need to know basis”. Did I hear you muttering some thing about an RTI Act? Forget it, you are too educated for your own good. Corporate India hasn’t heard of it. If they have, then their reason for still withholding information is because they signed a confidentiality agreement (with whom remains a mystery).

So Super Boss doesn’t think you need to know that your service line has been nixed and that when you come to work tomorrow, you might have a new boss, a new seat, a new team, a new designation or all of these. (Additionally, you may also be given the challenging but empowering responsibility of shredding the paper from all the departments’ trash).

However, what is of paramount importance and therefore you “need to know” is that he always sips Earl Grey in between biting into two crispy pale brown Samosas. If you forget, you will promptly be reminded through 3 emails – One from The Butterfly (saying “Oh! What have you done!!!!!”), one from the ageing Super Star (saying “Good job. Hehehe. Ooops! what I meant was good show, but do keep the samosas hot next time…) and one from THE character himself (You aren’t emailed directly of course, but CCed on a mail addressed to the Butterfly saying “It is a pity our managers cannot organize for basic food. I wonder what clients must be remarking”).

How should we tackle this?

Don’t show up to work for a few weeks. All those who need to know will know. Follow this up with a disheveled appearance one day and tell your manager you don’t want to talk about anything. Remain morose throughout the day. Ask the manager for his/ her cell phone and pretend to make a few calls and then wail loudly shouting “You killed him. What more do you want from me?”. Then cut the phone and leave immediately….If this doesn’t do it, then your manager is an android.

As for Super Boss, send him an email saying “Govt. of India bans Earl Grey” followed by a fake news item on how Earl Grey has been named the next illegal substance and all those in possession will face 10 years RI…

The Butterfly will be quelled with “Please tally attached excel sheet. Due to paucity of resources, you will be doing this work for the next 1 month. Do not delegate.”

The Ageing Super star will get ucomfortable with “So when are you moving to firm?”.