The history that we the people of India read is nothing but Paleo History of India.....It tells us about events and people of the past with almost no connection with the present... it is quiet irrelevant as far as the present of the Nation India is concerned. The name Paleo is burrowed from paleo botany or paleontology.....just as they tell us about ancient creatures that have disappeared long ago....and it is not obvious to find relations with the current world.
Though Paleo Botany or Zoloogy has important relevance as far as understanding the state of current plant or animal world and how life form evolved, the history that we read is worthless as it throws no light on the current state of the Indian nation.
The purpose of reading history or for that matter any subject is that we are able to make informed opinions on subject or issues in hand in current and future situations......and tragically the history that is currently taught in
Why Am I saying so :
Q Can you really tell me what is the cause of the kashmir problem? Only some of you might be having an answer....(at the most ten percent of the people reading ) but if I again put a question which history book are you quoting... i am sure out of these five percent almost eighty to nienty percent will have no answer ...(i deliberately leave these 1 percent as exceptions to the rule).....The problem here is not your poor knowledge base of history... the problem is utter lack of the issue from the history books....as these books are of paleo history, they have hardly an thing relevant for the current national issues.
What do u say ? You might say it is too recent to appear in the history books . OK. You have doubts... lets take another case :
Q What is the biggest socio-cultural-economic event in
Think….Think…..No its not 15 th August neither 26 th Jannuary .. they don’t match up with the biggest…(the issue is just size not importance..i never mean to say they are any less important) .
The answer is Dipawali, millions of people participate in it, thousand of corers of rupees are spent on it. Now if I ask --Why do we celebrate it?...Most of you will be having some or the other answer say for example a Marxist would say (I feel he must say) that this is the tradition when people celebrate a festival to rejoice on their produce of paddy in the Indian sub continent…..or some others might say we celebrate Diwali because Lord Ram returned to Ayodhya after his exile on this day…or some others might be having some other reason.. very true….but the important question is " Which history book are you quoting..?" and my dear friends I find that you must have known all these reasons from a variety of sources except history books..This is the case when it is said that our history tells us about rich cultural heritage..you yourself judge what I am saying is it correct or not.
This is not just.. A.. case ..for that matter why we celebrate Dusshera, EID, Holi, Rakshabandhan… n number of festivals …and the history books don’t tell us any thing about any of these. Paleo History.
U want more cases :
Issues entwined in history such as Ramjanambhoomi- Babri Masjid controversy, Kashi – Vishwanath ,
Many such issues can be quoted ….just a matter of some more thought and typing.
The point here is - What is the use of reading a subject which can not help us in even developing an informed opinion in matters that pertain to our daily life? That is worthless.. Paleo History….a burden on the students.. on our nation...only confusing them …. And making them miss important lessons that we can learn from such an important subject.... as it is rightly said “ History repeats Itself “ . I am afraid to say our political leaders are proving this allegation that “ Indians never had a sense of History “ right just to fulfill their narrow political gains.
They forget its not “Might that is right” our culture says “Right is Might” and truth will prevail in spite of all odds one day….AMEN
