The Challenges Before Secular Historiography of India

In the 83rd annual session of the Indian History Congress (IHC), certain issues concerning the teaching and purveying of secular historiography in India were tagged. Of the five resolutions taken up by the Executive Committee and the General Body of the IHC, three were: a) the history syllabus as drafted by the UGC to be imposed on students in the Indian Universities and Colleges; b) the tampering (with deletions and additions) of school textbooks which would adversely affect the general understanding of our shared past of young citizens; and c) deliberate attempts by a certain section to denigrate the senior liberal-Left historians by claiming that they confined themselves ‘in ivory towers, churning jargon-riddled papers’ (and I am quoting here a very secular ‘history enthusiast’ who had otherwise written that ‘saffronisation of history (is a) result of colonial hangover’). This in the words of a prominent author, is a ‘comfort nest’ of Left historians. According to such claims, the spaces they vacated as a consequence were filled by ‘Hindutva WhatsApp Groups’ who thus popularized myths in place of history.