Distorting history through a calendar

IIT-Kharagpur is currently in the news not for its role in shaping India's future but for distorting our past to advance a particular social agenda. File (Source: VIJAY SONEJI)

Built at the site of an infamous detention centre set up by the British government, the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT)-Kharagpur was the first IIT to be commissioned. Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, who gave a memorable convocation address at IIT-Kharagpur in 1956, said: “Here in the place of that Hijli Detention Camp stands the fine monument of India, representing India’s urges, India’s future in the making. This picture seems to me symbolical of the changes that are coming to India.” Notwithstanding the criticism of encouraging brain drain and generating intense admission competition among schoolgoing students, leading to the entrenchment of an unhealthy tuition culture, the premier IITs continue to have a transformative presence in India’s technical and science education system. Nehru was indeed right in saying that the IITs are India’s future in the making. But strangely, IIT-Kharagpur is in the news not for its role in shaping the future but for distorting our past to advance a particular social agenda.

An unscientific narrative