Jawaharlal Nehru's name 'removed' from Rajasthan textbook; state minister denies deliberate omission

The state education minister said that Nehru's name has not been omitted but was 'still there on page 91 and page 177'

The "removal" of India's first prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru's name from new textbooks for classes sixth to eight in Rajasthan elicited a strong reaction from the Congress even as the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) denied any wrongdoing. 

The textbook, according to an Indian Express report, has been written "following a year-long curriculum re­structuring exercise".

According to a NDTV report, the textbook, "Samajik Vigyan", makes no mention of  Nehru as a freedom fighter or as "a leader of Independent India".

The report adds that the textbook does not mention Mahatma Gandhi's assassination at the hands of Nathuram Godse.

The Rajasthan unit of the Congress on Sunday reacted strongly to the move.

State Congress chief Sachin Pilot told IANS on phone: "It's absolutely unacceptable that the BJP is working in a vindictive manner by not even mentioning India's first prime minister in the textbooks."

Pilot said that the party will agitate on the issue and approach the Union government as well as the governor and might even seek legal opinion.

"We will not allow this sort of deliberate elimination and deletion of (the names of) big leaders from textbooks as it is unbecoming of any elected government," he added.

Hitting out at the ruling BJP, Pilot said that they have proven that they are taking politics to a lower level.

The Congress leader added that Nehru's contribution to the freedom struggle and as the first prime minister of independent India is enshrined in history.

"The BJP can change textbooks but it can't rewrite history. We condemn this act. The Congress will oppose the Rajasthan government's move and ensure that these kind of things are not allowed as it shows a clear vindictive nature of the BJP," Pilot said.

The BJP, for its part, has denied any intention of omitting Nehru's name. 

According to the Indian Express, state Education Minister Vasudev Devnani on Sunday said that Nehru’s name has not been omitted but was “still there on page 91 and page 177”.

It shouldn't matter which chapters mentioned him as long as he was mentioned, Devnani added.

Page 91, according to the report, has just a one-line mention of the Nehru "presenting the objectives resolution in the chapter ‘Our Constitution’".

The report adds that on page 177, the only reference to Nehru is of him "having 'inaugurated' one of the steps on the course to Rajasthan’s unification".

Compared to older versions of the textbook, the report says, the mention of Nehru is "drastically" shorter even in the chapter dealing with the Constitution.

Earlier, Devnani, according to the Indian Express, had said that the government did not have a role in the new curriculum and that it was framed by the State Institute of Education and Training, an independent body.

Speaking to the Indian Express, Professor K S Gupta, former head of the department of history at Mohanlal Sukhadia University, Udaipur, denied any deliberate attempt to sideline Nehru and said: "We received instructions from the government to include certain aspects, but nothing on excluding anything.”

Gupta, the report adds, is the “chief patron” of the Chittor wing of a Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh affiliated project on history called the Akhil Bharatiya Itihas Sankalan Yojana. 

These books, uploaded on publisher Rajasthan Rajya Pathyapustak Mandal's website, are used by schools affiliated to the Rajasthan Board of Secondary Education.