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Civics to Politics: The Challenge of Text Creation

Latika Gupta
This paper documents and analyses a major transformative
attempt undertaken in India in social sciences at the upper primary
level. The National Curriculum Framework (NCF), a document which
spells out the vision and priorities for the school education, is
formulated by the National Council of Educational Research and
Training (NCERT), the apex body of the Ministry of Human Resource
Development. The process of curriculum revision and textbook writing
had remained a prerogative of a few experts until 2004, when the
NCERT democratized this process by opening it up to a larger pool of
intellectual resources from all over the country. Large teams were
constituted in order to first evolve as well as enrich the discourse of
every discipline and its pedagogic processes, and then translate the
discourse into syllabi and textbooks. At the level of curriculum design,
these committees came to be known as National Focus Groups, one of
which focused on the Teaching of Social Sciences. On its
recommendation, the subject of civics has been reconceptualised as
social and political life (SPL). The present paper analyses the process
by which the content of three textbooks for Grades VI, VII and VIII
(for 11 to 14 year old children) was developed. Among the several
themes included in these textbooks, this paper focuses on identity in
the context of gender, caste and religion. There are three sections in
this paper: NCF and its processes, the earlier civics; and the analysis
of the text of social and political life.
A proactive interpretation and implementation of the principles
of the Constitution of India was one of the prime goals of the
curriculum review exercise when it started in 2004. The earlier
curriculum framework (NCFSE 2000) had aroused anxieties by not
paying enough attention to several important issues, such as the
location of knowledge in real life contexts, opportunities for critical
reflection on socio-cultural milieu and Indias polity. In addition, there
was misrepresentation of certain historical facts and ideas about
certain groups of Indian society in the textbooks developed as part of
curriculum renewal exercise, beginning in the year 2001. The
responsibility to design NCF, as a means to provide a core curriculum
and create cohesion across diverse provincial curricula was assigned to
NCERT by the National Policy on Education-1986 (Government of India
1992) and the Programme of Action (1992). In 2004, when The
Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD) asked the NCERT to
review the National Curriculum Framework, there was a new
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government at the Center and a new political ethos. There had been
sharp debates in the Indian parliament about the changes brought
about, especially in history textbooks, under the processes of NCFSE-
2000 (NCERT 2000). The NCERT had experienced considerable political
intrusion in its affairs during the previous regime of the National
Democratic Alliance dominated by the Hindu nationalist Bhartiya Janta
Party. NCERT had faced severe public criticism which had made its
own internal ethos disturbed and sensitive. Media attacks on the
textbooks of history had triggered one of the most sharp and charged-
up debates in the history of school education. In fact, the debate and
controversies around school history and the vision of the Indian
Constitution were so heated and widespread that they could well have
played a role in shaping the results of the 2004 parliamentary election.
As a result of this, the new leadership of the NCERT in 2004 was under
enormous pressure to face the challenge of reestablishing its
institutional autonomy and of regaining its academic repute. In
addition, the new prevailing political ethos and governance demanded
more serious and rigorous processes to arrive at an understanding of
the problems and needs of the school education in India. The greatest
success of NCF -2005 is that it demolished the common belief that
changes in curriculum and textbooks reflect the change in political
leadership and are therefore politically motivated. NCF-2005 shifted
the focus of curricular debates and processes to the professional issues
and challenges involved in the construction of knowledge and methods
of teaching in every discipline. Learning Without Burden (Government
of India 1993), the report of a committee appointed by the MHRD in
the 1991, served as the basis for the curriculum review and
development exercise embarked on under the auspices of NCF-2005.
The National Curriculum Framework 2005
Linking of school knowledge with life outside the school and
nurturance of an over-riding identity informed by caring concerns
within the democratic polity of the country became two of the five
guiding principles of NCF-2005. An additional concern was the new
character of the Indian classroom. It had become truly diverse in
terms of its membership now representing the different socio-religio-
cultural and economic groups of Indian society. As a result of the
decade-long efforts of the central and state governments to
universalize elementary education, children belonging to those groups
and families which had been deprived of education in the past had
begun to enroll in large numbers. Indias diversity was reflected in its
classrooms for the first time and this formed a pressing challenge for
NCF based activities. The NCF acknowledged the need of reaffirming
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the value and dignity of every child and of showing the confidence that
every child can learn and succeed. This posed a serious challenge for
the process of syllabus and textbook development because Indian
childrens real life experiences exposed them to discrimination of
several types rather early in life. The gender, caste, language and
religion-based conflicts were, therefore, in the centre of the educative
process visualized under NCF. The NCF also acknowledged that in
India, a textbook is prescribed, not just recommended, hence it has
greater significance for shaping classroom pedagogy. Kumar (1988)
has traced the historical origins of the high status of textbooks in
Indian schools. He argues that the textbook-centred character of
school pedagogy in India is related to the historical circumstances
under which Indias present education system developed. More
specifically, the textbook culture can be traced to the early nineteenth
century when the East India Company took certain definite steps for
establishing an education system. The NCF recognized that the
historical roots were deep and could not have been challenged fully
under one exercise of curriculum reform. The transformation to using a
variety of pedagogic resources and considering textbook as one of
them requires several systemic changes including the raining of t
teachers.

Under NCF 2005 the curriculum reform was conceptualized as a
democratic exercise in which the aspiration was for a synergy in the
collective of scientists, social scientists, scholars of education,
activists, teachers and subject-experts to think and work together for
school education. This renewal activity became a dynamic process in
which peoples life experiences and diverse perspectives led to the
creation of the curricular document. As a discipline, education requires
an understanding of various other disciplines and field realities. Unlike
in the past, when development of textual material was seen as a
prerogative of a few experts, in 2004 it was conceptualized as a
participatory exercise in which large teams were constituted for every
area of knowledge as well as for all the three stages of curriculum
development, namely the curriculum framework, syllabus and
textbooks. The members of these teams included scholars of
education, activists, school teachers, NGO members, pedagogues and
researchers. It is during the consultations of the NCF that the need
was felt for expanding the scope and revisiting the nature of every
discipline, and the need for greater engagement with systemic issues,
such as the social composition of the school class, quality of
infrastructure and so on. Recognition of this need led to the creation of
National Focus Group Papers for which 21 committees were constituted
reflecting different disciplines and issues to be addressed for school
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reform. These committees mobilized the participation of scholars,
school teachers, NCERTS own faculty members, and the
representatives of reputed non-government organizations from all over
the country. There was, in addition, a National Steering Committee
which coordinated the ongoing debates in various National Focus
Groups (NFGs). The steering committee was chaired by the eminent
space scientist, Professor Yash Pal in whose leadership the path-
breaking report, Learning Without Burden, had taken its shape in
1993. The NFGs covered three broad themes: curricular areas,
national concerns and systemic reforms.


National Focus Group on Teaching of Social Sciences

The National Focus Group (NFG) on the Teaching of Social
Sciences viewed its curricular area as a dynamic combination of
diverse concerns of society which form the basis of various disciplines,
namely, economics, political science, geography, history and sociology
so that the learners get the pedagogic space to question the given
social norms and practices before evolving their own perspective. The
aim of social sciences, according to the NFG paper, is to create
opportunities to train the young mind to be critical about the
information she receives and the experiences she gets in real life. The
Position Paper of the NFG extended the NCFs idea of one of the aims
of education being commitment to democracy and values of equality,
justice, freedom, concerns for others well-being, secularism and
respect for human dignity and rights. It visualized education as
playing a proactive role in building a commitment to these values in
every learner at school. It demanded the creation of fresh discourses
and dialogues to build an ethos in the school to this end. Earlier, social
sciences were seen as familiarizing and transmitting agents of
information and facts about the past and the present which required to
be memorized. This had led to a tremendous increase in the content
over a period of time because the facts would increase every time the
textbooks were revised. As a result, in the past, school social sciences
failed to develop critical skills required to function as a citizen in a
specific socio-political milieu.

NFG identified five guiding points for the social science
curriculum which presented a new epistemological and pedagogic
frame for all levels of school curriculum. The first concern was not to
see India in a dyad of developed-developing constructs. The problem
with this construct is that it ignores the specificities of issues and leads
to the development of a kind of text which measures processes and
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events on a scale defined somewhere else in the world. Issues of
poverty, population, health, and education then become negative
factors in this frame without any possibility of critical reflection. NFG
on social sciences proposed multiple images on Indian nation in which
knowledge is not restricted to a large narrative about the nation-state.
In this frame, India was not to be presented as a collection of regions;
rather, knowledge had to be constructed for small regions and local life
was considered a meaningful and relevant category for educational
pursuits. In order to achieve a balance between the national and the
local, it is necessary to incorporate the local perceptions through which
the people can relate themselves to the nation. Doing this will also
ensure a much deeper and richer understanding of the nation(NCERT
2007a;p.3).

The second shift in the new epistemological frame was with
regard to the textbook. A social science textbook had always been
seen as a collection of facts and knowledge statements which students
needed to rote memorize so that they could reproduce it verbatim in
exams and otherwise. Consistent with NCFs view on knowledge and
learning, NFG asserted that textbook should demand critical thinking
and make the learner curious about the content. The third shift
proposed by the NFG was about the prevailing emphasis of social
science teaching on development issues.NFG thought that these issues
were important, but they were incapable of sufficiently incorporating
the concerns of justice, equality and dignity for the individuals and
groups of Indian society. The role of an individual in the process of
development was identified as a focus. The shift was from viewing an
individual as serving the state to a critical citizen who contributes to
the institutionalizing processes of democracy.

The fourth shift was in the area of gender which had been addressed
in the recent past by giving a brief space to illustrious women in every
discipline. NFG called for the gendering of the curriculum by making
the feminist perspective integral to any historical and contemporary
discussion. This call implied doing away with the grand narratives of
historical events. The NFG thought that the issues which were treated
as being peripheral earlier as well as issues of local importance had to
gain importance in the new syllabus and textbooks.
The fifth guiding point, which forms the core thesis of the
present paper, was about recognizing the subject of civics as one
which lacked a contemporary relevance. NCF had challenged the
common idea that knowledge is a stable body of facts and
experiences. In its third chapter, Curricular Areas, School Stages and
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Assessment, NCF argues for regular revision of each curricular area so
that it remains meaningful and consistent with the changing socio-
political ethos. NFG asserted that the subject traditionally conceived as
civics could not accommodate the recently developed disciplinary
knowledge in various fields, such as gender, media, reorganization of
countrys economy and trade relations, international relations and sub-
altern perspective on various larger issues.NFG suggested a change in
the name of the subject as well as the content which would reinvent
the meaning of politics by taking it beyond the battle for power and
present it as a social institution which affects peoples daily lives.
Learning Without Burden (NCERT 1993) had also proposed this
change though it had not spelt it out. This recommendation of NCF-
2005 posed a serious challenge as a new kind of textbooks had to be
developed for this novel subject for which a readymade structure of
theoretical frameworks was not available. The new subject had to
engage with the needs and concerns of citizenship education relevant
for present day society of India along with larger global concerns and
the emerging economic order.
In order to appreciate the development of this new subject and
its textbooks, it is important to examine the ideas inherent in the older
conception of civics in terms of its content as well as its role in
developing a citizen. This will help us in recognizing its several
inadequacies in meeting the goal of citizenship education and will also
help in constructing the background of the change brought about by
NCF-2005. The following section briefly deals with the historical
trajectory of civics in the Indian school system and its modified focus
deciphered from successive curriculum documents and the textbooks
of civics.
Civics: Education of Citizenship
Civics emerged as a school subject towards the end of the
nineteenth century. In India, it was introduced during colonial rule as
part of the formal education system. The citizenship education given in
the name of civics aimed to develop responsible citizens by informing
them about the functioning of formal institutions, so that they could
develop expected attitudes and responsibilities and assist the state in
its working. The onset of civics education laid down the agenda of
moral upliftment of the natives who lacked approved habits and
values. It was important for the colonial state to invest in law and
order in order to maintain its authority and moral superiority. The
Indian Citizen Indias first civics textbook published in 1902
emphasized cooperation, obedience and loyalty as necessary virtues in
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citizens, and justified the colonial state (Jain 1999). Colonial rule
ended in 1947, but the teaching and character of civics remained
intact despite several attempts to revise the curriculum by national as
well as state councils. The most important elements to emerge from
the colonial legacy of public life were, first, representative democracy
as the primary mode of sharing and control of power; second,
bureaucracy as the primary mode of social organization through which
public institutions functioned, and third, state-supported capitalism as
the primary mode of economic growth (Madan 2003).
Following independence, the Secondary Education Commission
(Government of India 1953) defined the role of civics in training
citizens, developing responsibility, improving their quality of
character and inculcating the right ideals, habits and attitude in
them. The NCERT which has been responsible for identifying
curricular goals at the national level interpreted this as the agenda of
disseminating information about the state. The syllabus developed by
the NCERT in 1976 and as late as 1985 stated that we need to teach
through civics, what government does for its citizens and what the
citizens owe to its government. The curricular implication of this goal
was to fill childrens minds with as much information as possible about
the rules and regulations governing the institutions and the actions of
a benevolent state. The students were expected to memorise
voluminous information about the process of elections, formation of
government, functioning of the parliament and rules of appointment in
legislature and judiciary and the developmental work done by the
government, such as construction of public toilets, roads, schools and
tube-wells in the rural areas. The challenges and conflicts in all the
above resulting out of the hierarchy embedded in Indias social order
were mentioned in two or three lines as opening and concluding
sections of the chapters of civics textbooks. The students had no
opportunity to grasp how the principles of democracy came to be
accepted as the most preferred and just form of social and political
organization in the world and in their country.
The continuity of the original character of civics implied that the
textbook writers, who were themselves Indian and wrote textbooks for
autonomous organization, namely the NCERT, continued to visualize
Indians as lacking the qualities of good citizens. Jain (2003) analysed
the civics text of the 1980s and 1990s and found that they presented
people as being irresponsible towards self and society. This failure to
do their duty is upheld as the proof of their moral weakness, which is
attributed to their ignorance about state institutions and government
efforts. By providing them with information, it would be possible to
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make them more aware and create in them desirable attitudes.
Responsibility towards the state was the dominant theme in the
syllabus of civics in the late 1990s.This was evident from the titles of
the textbooks written in 1999 as part of curriculum renewal exercise,
namely Our Government, How it Functions (Grade VI), A Textbook in
Civics; Our Civic Life (Grade VII); and Our Country Today, Problems
and Challenges (Grade VIII). The newly added discussion of problems
as indicated in the title of one of the textbooks was not centered on
the lives of people of the country. It was about the problems faced by
the government because of the people; for example, damage to public
property, such as buses and trains; misuse of telephone booths and
stealing of fans and bulbs from restrooms. These textbooks urged the
learners to become a kind of citizens who would not get emotional in
the matters of caste and religion as this could create conflict between
groups of people and managing any such conflict was seen as a great
problem for the government. An excerpt is presented here o elucidate
this point:
It is necessary for every student to reach school in time, or he or she is punished. Even in the society, some people
sometimes break the rules and to punish them an organization is needed. Your school is also an organization. Your
headmaster and others teachers jointly make the rules. They punish those students who do not obey these rules. The
work we have to do according to the rules can be called our duty.
(NCERT, 1995, Our Civic Life, A Textbook of Civics, Grade VI, p. 3)

In the year 2000, the school curriculum was re-visioned at the
behest of the rightist political leadership of NCFSE -2000 tilted towards
presenting India as primarily a Hindu nation; therefore, the processes
associated with it came to be known as saffronizing of school
curriculum. It was the subject of history which faced the brunt of this
process; however, civics was also affected by the motives of the
Bhartiya Janta Party. A chapter on terrorism was included for the first
time in civics textbooks. The idea of disciplining the citizen emerged
as a stronger concern than ever before as the act of raising voice of
dissent was presented as an immoral deed. In her analysis of school
textbooks of the pre-2005 period, Bhog (2010) argues that the civics
textbook did not differentiate between a voice of dissent and
terrorism. It present any act of disagreement from the state as a
terrorist activity. Her analysis is that an anxiety possibly exists that
the detailing of ideas like freedom of speech and expression, equality
and so on might result in the young learner outstepping his
boundaries, even becoming violent. This is evident in the statements
like, We must not trouble or harm our fellow citizens. We must never
be violent. At most, the citizen as a bearer of rights and resisting
unjust policies only emerges or is remembered in the nationalist
movement. The chapter on terrorism differentiated between Naxal
terrorism, ethnic terrorism and communal terrorism. All those
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participating in any of the above were seen as a threat to the State
and its authority. The context of terrorism was national as well as
global in which the states of Jammu and Kashmir, Punjab and 9/11 are
mentioned as examples. The text tried to enable the citizen-in-making
to differentiate between obedient citizens and terrorists by presenting
the latter as promoters of dissent and violence. Following is the
definition of a terrorist which was given in the text:

Terrorists have total disregard for human life including their own. They are ruthless, heartless and senseless criminals.
They commit crimes and cause bloodshed without any guilt. Their self-made ideology is the only justification for their
limitless crimes. To them, their cause is everything and others are either for or against it.
(NCERT 2002, Social Science: Part II, Grade VIII, p. 123,)

This textbook presented terrorism as a direct result of
undemocratic actions of certain people and conveyed to the reader
that the ultimate authority of physical force lies with the state which
can be used indiscriminately while handling conflicts of any kind. This
reflected states concern of maintaining law and order as supreme
which echoed one of the prime concerns of the colonial state, as
discussed earlier in this section.
Social and Political Life: The New Subject and its Syllabus
The NFG appointed under the NCF-2005 exercise on the teaching
of social sciences had proposed a radical change encompassing
nomenclature as well as inclusion of themes in the new subject which
would reflect real life contexts. A committee was constituted to
develop the syllabi of social sciences to be taught at the upper primary
and secondary levels, based on the recommendations of NCF-2005.
This committee suggested the name of social and political life (SPL)
for the new subject which would expand the scope of topics dealing
with different aspects of social, political and economic life.
The transition from civics to SPL was marked by a certain
amount of continuity in the syllabus, but a radical discontinuity in its
treatment. This meant that the formal institutional structures of
democracy, role of an individual in them and the functioning of
government remained in the syllabus, but the focus shifted to
experiential understanding of the ways in which the government
functions. Alongside, themes were developed based on those social
issues which help us in analyzing the working of social and political
institutions. A major step was taken by spelling out the objectives of
every theme, rationale behind including it and by giving its detailed
scope which gave a frame of reference for the textbook development
committee in order to develop the text. The Syllabus for Elementary
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Education (NCERT 2006) states: It is expected that a vision will
evolve that the Social Sciences provide both essentials skills of
comprehension that are fundamental to any activity , and a means of
self-understanding and fulfillment that can be diverting, exciting and
challenging. The syllabus for social sciences attempts to present both
the means through which sensitivity can be inculcated in the learners
as well as the information base required for it. A table is presented
here which provides the detailed lay-out and objectives of the themes
covered in the present paper, namely, identity in the context of
gender, caste and religion. The table also helps us to understand
with the example of gender and secularism how issues are
introduced in a general discussion, then woven in the functioning of
institutions and then are expanded to incorporate the concerns of
equality and social justice.
Table 1.1
Theme Objectives Theme Objectives Theme Objectives
Grade VI Grade VII Grade VIII
Diversity
What diversity
adds to our
lives

Prejudice and
discrimination

Inequality and
discrimination











Understand how
prejudice can lead
to discrimination

Understand the
difference between
diversity and
inequality

Context- Gender,
people living in
rural areas,
scheduled castes
and religious
minorities





Democracy




Unpacking Gender
Norms, values that
determine different
roles.

Understanding
inequality: The role
of gender in creating
unequal and
hierarchical
relations in society.

Gender division of
labour within family

The invisibilisation
of womens labour
Importance of the
idea of dignity
and equality in
democracy

Understand that
gender is a social
construct

Learn to integrate
gender-
construction in
different social
and economic
contexts

Link everyday
practices with the
creation of
inequality and
question it.
The
Constitution
How ideals of
secularism got
translated into
fundamental
rights.

Social Justice
and
Marginalized
Marginalization
of SC, ST, OBC
and minorities.

Forms of social
inequality,
effect of social
inequalities on
economic
inequalities

Reservation.

Develop an
appreciation of
human rights
guaranteed in the
Constitution.

Understand what
is meant by
marginalized

Gain a critical
understanding of
social and
economic
injustices

Develop skills to
analyse an
argument from
the marginalized
point of view.

(Source: Syllabus for Classes at the Elementary Level, NCERT 2006)


All committees which developed the syllabi for various stages
and subjects were expected to keep the cognitive level of intended
learners and the pedagogic resources as the two most important
criteria while developing their syllabus desgin. By pedagogic resources
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is meant, the committees awareness of incidents, literature, research
work, documents, films, art forms and songs which could be used
while developing the lessons for the textbook as well as by the teacher
for their lesson plans. This implied that that the themes were
elaborated with the help of objectives as well as exemplified with
pedagogic resources. An attempt was made to think in terms in which
children of respective age-group do, so that neither the objectives nor
the suggested resources remain abstract.

The syllabus provided guidelines for the textbook developers
which helped them to remain focused while drawing resources from a
wide range of material and kept them wary of preparing a dense text
stuffed with details and facts. The syllabus-developers ensured an
overlap in the content at various levels and provide a firm conceptual
foundation so that the leaners capacity for investigation may develop
and evolve over a period of time. The syllabus provided guidelines on
the basis of which textbook developers could provide a list of possible
projects with the lessons. The syllabus also engages the teachers in a
discussion on the rationale behind including certain themes and the
manner in which its conceptual progression has been presented for
different grades.

Textbook Development Committee and the Process of Development

A separate committee of textbook development was constituted
for every subject and for each stage. The social sciences had three
different committees at the upper-primary level: for history,
geography and SPL. Constituting a team for SPL was more complex
than other subjects because there was no precedence for this subject
and it demanded a multidisciplinary approach to every theme. The
overall in-charge of social science textbooks was an eminent historian
who teaches at the University of Calcutta. The Chief Advisor for the
SPL committee, next in terms of responsibility and decision-making
was from a premier research institute of social sciences. She steered
the discussions on the resources with which the text would be
developed. The training of the chief advisor in the discipline of
international politics enriched the discourse of SPL as she could bring
in a global perspective on topics of local relevance and could,
therefore, approach some of the themes in greater depth. For
example, the discussion of secularism got enhanced when she
introduced the American model of secularism, which is different from
Indian model. Similarly, the common understanding of the team on
market came to include a feminist critique of the way the concept of
market has evolved and functioned till now. The other committee
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members came from backgrounds in economics, political science,
journalism, social work and education. They had either taught at the
university or at the school level or worked in the NCERT. Some of
them had the experience of developing progressive textual material in
non-government organizations. Where the committee drew its
vibrancy was from the field based activists who brought in their
experiences of ongoing struggles with the state, challenges they had
faced while addressing the issues of panchayat (village-level governing
council), health, women rights, water, legal literacy and media. The
activists who had worked on the issues of health and media joined the
team for the Grade VII textbooks and the ones who had worked in the
field of minority rights and legal literacy joined for the textbook of the
Grade VIII committee. Thus, while certain members were stable which
gave theoretical rigour and continuity in all the three textbooks others
provided experiential knowledge base while participating for a
particular theme.
In the first week long workshop, every theme was discussed in
order to plan the overall design of the chapters and the examples as
well as case-histories with the help of which the text had to be
developed. The members took specific responsibility of writing a
portion of any chapter, depending on their training, interest and
experience. Written text was circulated over emails before the next
workshop so that all the members came after having read the drafts.
Each and every line of every members piece was read aloud,
discussed and feedback was given to develop it further. In the third
workshop, when second drafts were brought in for discussion and
feedback, a rough structure would start emerging in every chapter.
The committee made a decision about which case story could be
woven in the text while others were to be dropped. Imaginary
narratives were developed on the basis of actual case-stories.
In the next workshop, the focus was on the integration of theoretical
perspective and fine-tuning of the link between the two aspects,
namely, narratives based on case-stories and theory. This was
followed by a round of language editing which was based on the
awareness of the cognitive capacity of the intended readers. The
students of upper-primary grades are in their pre-adolescence years
when the formal operational thought just begins. This was kept in
mind throughout the process of deciding on the theoretical details and
the language to be used to present those details. In order to enable
the young, pre-adolescent readers to grasp the abstraction of
theoretical concepts and principles of the Constitution of India, the
language of narratives and the discussion was kept simple and it
underwent several rounds of editing to achieve a balance between
simple language and the complexity of social processes and
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institutions. It was at this stage that the in-text and end-text exercises
were developed. The in-text exercises were developed in order to build
the discussion and highlight certain key issues for the reader. End text
exercises were developed with the idea that the learner should not
remain restricted to one or two contexts given in the chapter, but
rather should be able to use the learning to take a stand in other,
similar or related contexts. For the first time in the history of textbook
development in India that photographs were used to ask questions at
the end-text exercises.

The SPL textbook committee drew pedagogic devices from a
wide range of resources which included newspaper articles, stories
published in magazines and books, government reports and activist
literature. As a result of this wide range of pedagogic material, the
process of copyright remained a burning issue throughout the process
of text development. It happened on several occasions that certain
authors refused to give the permission to use their stories almost at
the final stage when the chapter was absolutely ready. This particular
aspect required a great deal of mobilizing of resources to convince
authors, institutions and professionals to forgo their individual
interests for the benefit of the children of the country. The created a
task for the leadership at the NCERT and the chief-advisor to
strategically develop pressure through allies on the owners of
copyright in order to allow the committee to use their material.

A parallel process of tapping the resources of newspapers and a few
magazines to share their collection of photographs started after the
second workshop. It was a real struggle to get good photographs
which were relevant to the chapters and which might enable the
learners to grasp the context of the theme. Illustrators were appointed
and invited to participate in the workshops from this stage so that they
could develop a detailed understanding of the situations for which
illustrations were needed. Photographs and illustrations were not
treated as mere tools for supporting the text; rather, they were
integral to the chapter and were designed with the intention that the
reader will be able to visualize the intention even if she was not
familiar with a context. The SPL committee used folk art forms of India
which created a specific context for the readers. The SPL textbook of
Grade VI has illustrations made in Madhubani art which is a traditional
art form practiced in the state of Bihar. The lay-out and designing of
the text is very important as it sets an impression in the readers
mind. The committee spent considerable energy and time in
supervising the lay-out work of every textbook. The graphic designers
worked in close coordination so that they could grasp the aspirations
14
of the committee for every part of the chapter and represent it
visually.

The draft chapters were then circulated among a few
educationists, political-scientists, economists and sociologists and
school teachers for their feedback. They were asked to comment on
the integrity of the text towards the theoretical standpoints and the
discussion of ideas. Based on their feedback, the chief advisor and one
or two committee members finalized the textbook which was then sent
for a final copy-editing to professional editors. It is at this point that
the publication department of NCERT took over and made the final
decisions on quality of paper, printing and other production issues.

A Dynamic Text for Citizenship Education

The aim of SPL text was to encourage the learners to develop
informed viewpoints on social issues, formal institutions and figure out
the challenges that the country faces today in making the vision of the
Constitution of India a reality. This was different from the past when
the content of the textbooks appeared to be helpful only for facing
examinations. The text, in earlier textbooks, was dull, loaded with
information and did not appear relevant for life outside the four walls
of the classroom and more importantly, the room in which students sat
to write their answers to exam-questions. In the following section, I
will present an analysis of the SPL text to explain how the vision of
NCF on learning and the NFGs perspective on the education of
citizenship were articulated in a text which provides an overview of the
democratic process and gives an opportunity to the learner to engage
with it by placing herself in the role of an interested citizen-in-making.

The SPL textbook of Grade VI opens with the theme of Diversity. The
concepts addressed under this theme are: diversity, conflict and
interdependence. India is introduced as a nation of social diversity with
the help of a discussion on linguistic variations, cultural differences
based on geography, and the multiplicity of art forms practiced around
the country. The discussion has been built in such a way that the
learner can gradually move to the point of realizing that all diversities
are not celebrated and appreciated by the citizens of India; that, in
fact, it often serves as a basis for prejudices and stereotypes against
others. The discussion tries to convey in a subtle manner that nobody
can be treated as the other in a democracy and that a difference
should be treated merely as a difference. An effort has been made to
bring the reader in the mode of reflective analysis by arguing that
stereotypes do not allow us to understand individuals as people. If we
15
view people in a stereotypical manner then the people exist only as
members of a collectivity, without any individual qualities, skills, traits,
interests and emotions. It begins with the case of girls about who
peoples perceptions are fixed in certain patterns of behavior, interests
and capabilities. Girls are soft spoken and gentle, they are well-
behaved, they are emotional; are some of the statements on which
the learners attention is evoked to discuss and think of reasons which
uphold such perceptions. An extract is presented here from the text
which uses the context of Muslims in India, a minority group about
which a large number of prejudices and stereotypes exist in the
country and in the larger world.

A common stereotype about Muslims is that they are not interested in educating girls and
therefore do not send girls to school. However, studies have now shown that poverty amongst
Muslims is an important reason why Muslim girls do not attend school or drop out from school
after a few years. Wherever effort has been made to reach education to the poor, there the Muslim
community has shown an interest in sending their girls to school. For example, in the state of
Kerala the distance between the school and the home is not much. There is a good government bus
service that helps teachers reach schools in rural areas and over sixty percent of the teachers are
women. These factors have helped children from poor families, including Muslim girls, attend
school in much larger numbers. In other states, where such efforts have not been made children
from poorer families whether Muslim, tribal or so-called lower castes find it difficult to attend
school. Therefore, poverty, not religion, is the cause for non-attendance of Muslim girls in
school.
(Grade VI, Chapter 2, Diversity and Discrimination, p.18, NCERT, February 2006 )

The following discussion in the textbook elaborates on the point that
the people, who are poor and belong to the group whose culture is not
valued, face double discrimination and do so everywhere. The above
passage presents a fine example of a pedagogic text which engages
the reader with an argument based on evidence and findings of a
study, as is done in social sciences. It situates Muslim girls and their
issues in the larger context of poverty and the states inability to
provide sufficient resources for them to break the cycle of poverty
which they inherit from their families. The text also situates the
struggles of Muslim girls on a par with the problems of other groups
which are largely poor and are viewed as backward and non-
progressive by the mainstream upper class Hindus. The text places a
scientific argument before a pre-adolescent reader rather than giving a
moral lecture to the effect that we should not think in derogatory
terms about Muslims and Dalits, as was done in earlier textbooks. By
using the context of Muslims within the initial pages of the textbook,
the text conveys an unprecedented confidence in admitting that there
are people who suffer because they belong to particular communities
and that the state is also struggling to make provisions for those
communities. The state does not appear as an institution which can be
critiqued in isolation for its failings.
16

This marks a big shift in the view on Indias diversity which had
been described for decades in school textbooks basically as simply a
variety of practices in every aspect of life including religious faith. In
the SPL text, the details of that multiplicity come to the forefront
where the discrimination inherent in diversity can be seen. Similarly,
the context of Dalits (Scheduled Castes) has been elucidated by taking
an excerpt from the autobiography of Dr. B.R. Ambedkar, who headed
the drafting committee of the Indian Constitution and who himself was
a Dalit and suffered discrimination at every step in life. An episode of
his childhood has been included in the chapter on diversity. This
inclusion serves a dual purpose. On one hand, it addresses the
learners who belong to upper-caste and upper/middle class families by
exposing them to a different way of life in which people fight with their
poverty while the rich and upper- caste groups view them as lowly and
backward. On the other hand, the text addresses the learners who
belong to lower-caste groups, tribal groups and religious minorities
and girls, and to them it conveys a sense of dignity, a feeling that their
life experiences can contribute to the process of knowledge
construction. This is how the SPL text incorporates the vision of NCF to
affirm value and dignity to every learner and impart to him or her a
positive identity.

The first two chapters of the SPL textbook of Grade VI delineate
the social and cultural composition of India and present the life of
people in different theoretical categories. This prepares the learner to
get into the details of every category in the later chapters of all the
three textbooks and give the opportunity to understand the ongoing
institutionalization of democracy in India.

Gender
Democracy and equality are the main themes in the textbook of
Grade VII. An attempt has been made to present democracy as a
changing and evolving political system. The first step to ensure
equality is to analyse the present scenario so that hindering aspects
and practices can be identified. The importance of the ideal of equality
in a democracy has been discussed in detail in Grade VII textbook..
The context of everyday experiences of girls and women has been
used to enable the learner to understand how democracy and equality
are related to the creation of differences that are discriminatory in
nature. Another aim for choosing gender to analyse the above
indicated relation is to introduce the young learners to the field of
gender. The specific objectives of introducing the learners to gender
based knowledge in their adolescent years, when they start forming
17
abstract ideas about the world and people around them are: one, to
enable students to understand that gender is a social construct; two,
learn to enquire about gender constructions in socio-cultural and
economic contexts; and three, to trace inequalities in everyday
practices and question it. Some of the themes, which have been
included in SPL of Grade VII have been introduced for the first time in
school textbooks and the treatment of certain earlier used themes has
been very different. The textbook committee was aware that teachers
might get baffled while teaching the new themes with the help of the
recommended pedagogical approach. A note was, therefore, prepared
for teachers to support them so that they can conceptualize the theme
in its entirety and plan their own lessons with an awareness of the
structure of the text.

The Teachers Note on gender begins by admitting that this term is
mostly misunderstood or is not understood at all because its use is
limited to specific settings, such as training programmes although it is
a kind of knowledge which has been theorized on the basis of our
everyday experiences. The note introduces the teacher to the concept
of gender, its nuances, and a caution that it should not be treated as
knowledge which only concerns women. The teacher is reminded that
gender is equally about the life of boys.
The first chapter in this theme, Growing up as Boys and Girls,
introduces the learner to varied experiences of a girl growing up in
Samoa and a boy growing up in the state of Madhya Pradesh in central
India. The narratives and in-text questions have been used to build a
discussion on the point that the two societies make clear distinctions
between boys and girls. They set different expectations from them and
provide differential resources to them.

Boys are usually given cars to play with and girls get dolls. Both toys can be a lot of fun to play
with. Why are girls then given dolls and boys cars? Toys become a way of telling children that they will
have different futures How girls must dress, what games boys should play, how girls need to talk softly and
boys need to be tough. All these are ways of telling children that they have specific roles to play when they
grow up to be men and women. Later in life this affects the subject we can study or the careers we can
choose. (Grade VII, Chapter 2, Growing up as Boys and Girls, NCERT February 2007)

The text then moves on to the issue of labour that women do,
which is not counted as work equal to work men do. A narrative has
been built up in a family setting in which a mother goes on a strike
and stops doing her household work. Nobody gets meals on time and
the entire household comes to a standstill. Through a storyboard,
developed with the help of dialogues between a woman and her family
members, the importance of tasks that women do in their housewife
role has been brought to the forefront. The related issue of house
maids has been discussed with the help of the narrative of a maid
18
working in a household in Delhi. The narrative draws the learners
attention to the experience of the maid whose employers do not give
her enough food to eat and do not allow her to wear footwear even in
winter. These two narratives help the learner to treat womens life and
their labour as a point of enquiry with the help of the analytical frame
offered in the text. A list of tasks has been drawn which women do,
such as carrying heavy loads of firewood, sweeping, washing clothes
and standing for long hours in front of stoves in summer. The text
then draws the learners attention towards the irony of womens lives
in the following line: The work women do is strenuous and physically
demanding words that we normally associate with men. By
elaborating on the work done by an urban mother, house-maids and
rural women, a case has been built up about the work that women do
which is not treated as equal to the work that men do.

The next step in the text is to help the learner understand the
issue of invisibilisation of womens labour in a larger context by using
primary data. The following table and related questions have been
given in the text to give an opportunity for data-analysis -- a method
in social-sciences -- to arrive at an understanding of social patterns:


State

Women Paid
hours per week

Women Unpaid
hours per week

Women
(Total)

Men paid hours
per week

Men Unpaid Housework
hours per week

Men
(Total)
Haryana

23

30

?

38

2

?

Tamil Nadu 19 35 ? 40 4 ?
Source : Central Statistical Organization of India (1998-1999)

What is the total number of work hours spent by women in Haryana and Tamil Nadu each week?
How does this compare with the total number of work hours spent by men?

It is expected that learners will be able to get an experience of
argument- building process in the context of gender. And that the use
of gender will evoke critical reflection about the division of labour in
their families, their own lives and the lives of women around them.
The issue of individual identity is integrally linked to the idea of work
that people do. The discussion on womens labour is followed by the
discussion on work that women do outside home at the beginning of
the next chapter, titled Women Change the World. It starts with an
activity in which students are asked to draw images of a farmer, a
factory worker, a nurse, a scientist, a pilot and a teacher in boxes
which are given in the textbook. Below those drawing boxes, students
have to fill in the following table which gives them an opportunity to
collect data themselves:

19

See what images your class drew by filling in the table below. Add up the number of male and female images
separately for each occupation.

Category Male Image Female Image
Teacher
Farmer
Factory Worker
Nurse
Scientist
Pilot

Have all women been drawn as nurses? Why?
Are there fewer images of female farmers? If so, why?

The second question links with the narrative of a landless
labourer Thulasi which is given in the chapter of rural livelihoods in
Grade VI. Thulasi narrates her daily routine of long working hours in
paddy fields where she remains bent on her back with her feet soaked
in muddy water all day. She also walks long distances to collect
firewood and drinking water. Her husband Raman works as a labourer
too on somebody elses fields. The narrative has been given to
elucidate the difficult life of millions of landless labourers living in rural
parts of country. While negotiating the above exercise, it is expected
that the learners will relate the example of Thulasi and figure out for
themselves that millions of women work in Indian fields but are not
identified as farmers. The stereotyping of women in certain
professions, such as nursing and rejection of women from earning
certain professional identities is the point to which the text tries to
take the learner without offering an explicitly didactic text. Learners
are expected to arrive at their conclusions by their own calculations
and analysis. A gender perspective on the larger socio-economic
reality has been inbuilt with the help of Thulasis narrative. The NFG on
Gender Issues in Education (NCERT 2007b) had asked for the
gendering of the school curriculum by integrating gender as a theme in
all the areas of knowledge.

It is in the last section of the chapter that the link between
gender and democracy acquires vividness for the learner. This section
is on Womens Movement in India which has used campaigning, raising
awareness and protesting in order to fight discrimination against
women on several fronts. Sexual harassment guidelines, anti-dowry
law and photographs of protesting women have been used. This
section achieves much more than awareness of issues which women
have raised. The central learning involves the various media that can
be used to fight against oppression in a democracy and the fight can
be against the state and institutions. The idea that a collective voice
20
can mobilize institutions including the judiciary to make laws comes
across quite vividly.

The in-text questions are intended to encourage the learners to
figure out for themselves how power relations operate in familial and
institutional settings. There is no attempt to portray a glossy picture of
India as a nation; in fact, the effort has gone in the direction of
enabling the learners to identify inequalities and unequal power
relations so that they become aware and critical citizens. One of the
struggles of Indian democracy has been to provide dignity to every
citizen. Women have suffered a great deal in this regard. The SPL text
envisages that the millions of girls who study this background are
future citizens and need to experience dignity.


Social Marginalisation: Experiences of the Dalits and Muslims

The dull and often confusing style adopted by the older civics
textbooks often failed to distinguish between processes, institutions
and individuals involved in governance. SPL text has taken a step
ahead and grounded the content in the lives of students. It presents
the real life contexts to enable the learners to appreciate that the idea
of democracy is not limited to the functioning of government
institutions, but that it depends primarily on the role played by
citizens. The SPL textbooks make a departure from the earlier
textbooks by naming and identifying specific forms of inequality. The
caste and religious distinctions are present in every Indian classroom
therefore, the text has been developed with great sensitivity to the
fact that several students will find echoes of their own experience of
denigration or discrimination in it. The teacher has also been
requested in the teachers note to ensure that no child or group of
children feel discriminated against, ridiculed or left out from these
discussions.

Equality
The textbook of Grade VII begins with the theme of Equality in
Indian Democracy which deals with the experiences of people involving
unequal treatment either because of their socio-economic class, caste
or religion. The discussion on caste starts with the point that the
children living in rural India learn about their caste identity at an early
age and contrary to popular belief, caste consciousness and
distinctions based on it are equally prevalent in urban areas. The
learners attention is drawn to the matrimonial advertisements
published in the Sunday edition of English and Hindi newspapers. The
21
matrimonial supplement is divided into religion, caste and sub-caste
based categories. The alliance-seekers ask for a match with certain
specifications of caste as well as sub-caste. The SPL text gives a
scanned copy of a few of such advertisements and a few questions to
encourage the urban students in order to reflect on the prevalence of
caste in cities. This also gives an opportunity of critical analysis to the
rural students about how organized the caste based distinctions in
urban India are. For all students, this provides an opportunity to
develop an informed viewpoint based on primary data. The text moves
forward by giving an excerpt from the autobiography of a Dalit writer,
Omprakash Valmiki, who was made to sit away from others in school
because he belonged to a caste group which is considered
untouchable in the hierarchy of caste system.

He (Valmiki) writes, The playground was way larger than my small physique could handle and in cleaning it, my
back began to ache. My face was covered with dust. Dust had gone inside my mouth. The other children in my class
were studying and I was sweeping. Headmaster was sitting in his room and watching me. I was not even allowed to get
a drink of water. I swept the whole day From the doors and windows of the school rooms, the eyes of the teachers
and he boys saw this spectacle.
Why do you think Omprakash Valmiki was being treated unequally by his teacher and his classmates? Imagine
yourself as Omprakash and write four lines about how you would feel if you were in the same situation as him.

The next narrative in the text is about a Muslim couple Mrs. and
Mr. Ansari who wanted an apartment on rent in a large city of India.
They were refused all apartments on flimsy grounds, e.g. the landlady
did not want to keep meat eaters as tenants, etc. The property dealer
suggested to them to change their name to Mrs. and Mr. Kumar. The
Ansaris did not agree to this and wasted a whole month before finding
a landlord who was willing to give them a place on rent. These two
experiences of caste and religion based prejudices have been used
in the text to enable learners to understand violation of the dignity of
fellow citizens. Omprakash Valmiki was too young to do anything
about the situation that he was in and the Ansaris did not change their
name because it was a matter of dignity and self-respect for them.
After the autobiographical text and the narrative, the textbook
engages the learner rather directly with the issue that not all Indian
citizens are treated with dignity by others and that inequality in
treatment is not because of any individual action but because of caste
or religion. This point is followed by a discussion on equality as an
ideal in the Constitution of India, what all it includes and how the
governments try to implement this ideal through laws and schemes to
help the disadvantaged communities.

In addition to laws, the government has also set up several schemes to improve the lives of communities and
individuals who have been treated unequally for several centuries. These schemes are to ensure greater opportunity for
people who have not had this in the past. One of the steps taken by the government includes the midday meal scheme.
This refers to the programme introduced in all government elementary schools to provide children with cooked lunch.
While government programmes play an important role in increasing equality of opportunity, there is much that still
22
needs to be done. While the midday meal programme has helped increase the enrollment and attendance of poor
children in school, there continues to be big differences in our country between schools that the rich attend and those
that the poor attend. Even today there are several schools in our country in which Dalit children, like Omprakash
Valmiki, are discriminated against and treated unequally. This is because people refuse to treat them as equal even
though the law requires it.
One of the main reasons for his is that attitudes change very slowly. Even though persons are aware that discrimination
is against the law, they continue to treat people unequally on the basis of their caste, religion, disability, economic
status and because they are women.... Establishing equality in a democratic society is a continuous struggle and one in
which individuals as well as various communities in India contribute.
(Grade VII, Chapter 1, On equality, p.11-12, NCERT, February 2007)

The text encourages the learner to empathize with those who
suffer unequal treatment at an individual level because of their birth in
a particular caste group or religion. With the help of these narratives,
the discussion on equality as an ideal of Indian democracy acquires a
lively character. It gets easy for the learner to recognize that it is an
achieving equality for all is an ongoing struggle for India and in that
each individuals contribution is essential. The law is on one end of the
tight string of equality and the citizens attitude and behaviour are on
the other end. The state is presented as an institution which faces
challenges because of the behaviour and prejudices of its citizens. The
state is not articulated in a parental light which conveys that it can
take care of everything and resolve conflicts. The resolution of conflicts
is presented in the SPL text as a persistent endeavor in which the
governments efforts need citizens support and secular behaviour. The
chapter ends with a brief discussion on the issue of equality in other
democracies, e.g. the United States. The Civil Rights Movement of
African-Americans is given as an example of a similar struggle. This
discussion can help the learner to construct a wider scene of
democracy and its struggles in other parts of the world. The SPL
reader is inspired through such discussions to conclude that there have
been struggles to fight inequality in different parts of the world.

This discussions on diversity and equality help to build the
argument for social justice and marginalization which certain
communities suffer. There are two chapters in the unit on social
marginalization in the textbook of Grade VIII, titled Understanding
Marginalisation and Confronting Marginalization, which present a
critical text on the experiences of marginalised groups of Indian
society. In the following section, we will examine how certain caste
and religious groups have got excluded from mainstream resources
and opportunities. A variety of pedagogic tools have been used in this
unit, namely, government reports, data, poems, songs, narrative and
case-studies.



23
Marginalisation

The theme opens with a discussion on what it means to be
socially marginalised. Beginning with the conflicts that adolescents
face in their peer group, the discussion moves on to identifying the
basis on which certain groups are made to feel excluded.

Their marginalisation can be because they speak a different language, follow different customs or belong
to a different religious group from the majority community. They may also feel marginalised because they
are poor, considered to be of low social status and viewed as being less human than others. Sometimes
marginalised groups are viewed with hostility and fear. This sense of difference and exclusion leads to
communities not having access to resources and opportunities and in their in ability to assert their rights.
They experience a sense of disadvantage and powerlessness vis--vis more powerful and dominant sections
of the society who own land, are wealthy, better educated and politically powerful.
(Grade VIII, Chapter 7, Understanding Marginalisation, p.80, NCERT March 2008)

This passage introduces the learner to view the Dalits (Scheduled
Castes) and Muslims as an analytical category of social-sciences as
people whose experiences need to be analysed with the help of certain
indicators which are considered data. Drawing from the discussion on
secularism given earlier in the same textbook, the learner is reminded
that the Constitution of India safeguards the minority communities
against the possibility of cultural dominance, discrimination and
disadvantage by the majority. The text then gives an opportunity to
review how far this right of minorities is available to them. The review
has to be done by analyzing the following data:

Public Employment of Muslims (percentage)
Population

Indian Administrative
Services

Indian Police
Services

Indian Forest
Services

Central Public
Sector Unit(PSU)

State
PSU
Banks

13.5 3 4 1.8 3.3 10.8 2.2
Source: Social, Economic and Educational Status of the Muslim Community in India, Prime Ministers High Level Committee
Report 2006



Basic Amenities, 1994
Kutcha House

63.6% of Muslims live n Kutcha houses.
55.2% of Hindus live in Kutcha houses
Electricity

30% of Muslims have access to electricity
43.2% of Hindus have access to electricity
Piped Water

19.4% of Muslims have access to the piped water
25.3% of Hindus have access to the piped water
Source: Abusareh Shariff (1999), India Human Development Report: A Profile of Indian States in the 1990s, Oxford University Press
for National Council of Applied Economic Research, New Delhi,p.236,238,240.

Do Muslims have equal access to basic amenities?
What do these figures convey?

24
These two tables and the discussion are meant to help the
learner to realize that Muslims have continued to be a disadvantaged
group in the country and so much so that the Prime Minister had to
institute a committee to study this. The table is intended to enable the
learner to use a methodological tool of data-analysis to understand
that a range of social and economic indicators alone can show us the
reality of peoples lives and not what is often said at home, in the
neighborhood or among friends. The learner gets an opportunity,
through this analysis, of developing an informed viewpoint as opposed
to an opinion based on prejudices conveyed by adults. The assumption
of the SPL text is that this experience will offer training for a young
mind to consider evidence for making an opinion, and that this
experience will get extended to other aspects of social life as well. The
following discussion helps the learner to construct a comprehensive
picture of the experiences of the Muslims in India as it draws
connections between their marginalisation and their insecurities:

Muslim customs and practices are sometimes quite distinct from what is seen as the mainstream. Some not all
Muslims may wear a Burqa, sport a long beard, wear a fez, and these become ways to identify all Muslims. Because of
this, they tend to be identified differently and some people think they are not like the rest of us. Often this becomes an
excuse to treat them unfairly, and discriminate against them. Do you remember reading in your Class VII textbook
about how the Ansaris were finding it difficult to rent a house? This social marginalisation of Muslims in some
instances has led to them migrating from places where they have lived, often leading to the ghettoisation of the
community. Sometimes, this prejudice leads to hatred and violence.
(Grade VIII, Understanding Marginalisation, p.89-90, NCERT, March 2008)


Followed by the exercise of data-analysis, this discussion can inspire
the learner to accept an argument that the life of Muslims cannot be
understood in isolation from their experiences of discrimination. It also
highlights the complexity of the issues that religious minorities face,
involving several layers of human behaviour which need to be
identified and analysed systematically in order to develop an inclusive
perception of social reality as a whole. The NCF-based political science
textbooks of secondary grades deal with this issue in greater detail by
discussing the religious conflicts that have taken place in India in the
recent past in which hundreds of innocent Muslims were killed.
Secularism is a complex issue in India and the SPL text aims at
developing a citizen who reflects on the information and experiences of
people around her before taking a stand.

The second chapter, Confronting Marginalisation, in this theme
introduces the learner to the ways in which groups and individuals
have challenged inequalities by invoking the Constitution of India in
the course of their struggles. The chapter also includes the laws that
protect such groups from continued exploitation and policies that
promote the access of these groups to development. These have been
25
presented with the help of narratives and by elaborating the provisions
of various laws and the Articles of the Indian Constitution. Article 17
prohibits the practice of untouchability and empowers the Dalits for
educating themselves, entering temples, using public toilet facilities,
etc. Article 15 of the Constitution prohibits discrimination against any
Indian citizen on the basis of religion, caste, sex or place of birth. After
mentioning these articles, the text discusses some of the schemes
which have been introduced by the state and central governments,
such as, subsidized hostels for the students of Dalit communities and
reservation of seats for them in education and government
employment. It is admitted in the text that reservation is one of the
most significant and highly contended policies.

It is build on an important argument that in a society like ours, where for centuries sections of the population have
been denied opportunities to learn and to work in order to develop new skills or vocations, a democratic government
needs to step in and assist these sections.

The text gives details of how the reservation policy is implemented by
drawing upon the lists of castes which are included in this category.
The text gives an opportunity to get a feel of what it means to be a
Dalit by giving a case-study. The narrative is of a Dalit boy, Rathnam,
who refused to take part in a ritual which had traditionally been
performed by his community people on account of being untouchables.
They had to wash the feet of all the priests in the village on the
occasion of a religious ceremony and then bathe in the used water.
Dalits were not allowed to enter any temple in that village. Rathnam
was a student of engineering. He angered the people of upper-castes
and his own community by his refusal to participate in the ritual and
his confident arguments against it. As a result of this, he and his
family were ostracized by the entire village and some people even set
their hut on fire. They somehow saved their lives by running away. He
lodged a complaint in the police station under the Scheduled Castes
and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989. Other Dalit
families still did not come out in his support as they were scared of
facing similar consequences. The case was picked up by the media
which helped to publicize the conflict. The derogatory ritual was called
off, but Rathnams family moved out of the village as they continued
to be ostracized by others. The information about the provisions of the
Constitution and various laws to safeguard the dignity and life of
marginalised groups is juxtaposed in the text with the real life
experience of a Dalit. The learner is asked to reflect on this case by
responding to questions about violation of Rathnams fundamental
rights and the behaviour of the upper-castes and his own community.

26
The NFG on Problems of Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe
Children (NCERT 2007c) had suggested that the curriculum should
offer opportunities of reflection on the Dalit epistemology, knowledge
and protests. This SPL text makes an attempt through Rathnams and
others narratives to enable present-day children learn that caste-
based discrimination is not a thing of past. Though such behavior has
been declared criminal, it continues to be a part of the life experience
of a large number of people. The conflict between the tradition and
modern laws also becomes vivid for the SPL learner who has to engage
with the issue of equality and marginalisation co-existing in the socio-
political ethos of India. The assumption is that an informed learner will
have the potential to become a citizen who will be aware of the
struggles of fellow Indians and will himself or herself behave
responsibly towards others.

Conclusion
NCF-2005 aimed at broadening the scope of pedagogic texts by
mobilizing a wide range of resources for curricular reform. The
description of the process whereby the SPL text was developed,
examples from it and the discussion presented in this paper highlight
how the new textbooks have attempted to translate the goal of NCF in
pedagogic material. The textbooks of Social and Political Life have
widened the scope of what could be said to young learners by way of
sharing the complex reality Indian democracy faces. The SPL text is an
attempt in the direction of developing a reflective citizen who has the
skills and capacities to analyse and make sense of the world. By not
presenting a didactic and declarative text, SPL conveys its trust in the
young learner to imbibe the ideals and processes of democracy and to
contribute to nation-building as an individual. Of course, a lot depends
on the teachers who teach the SPL text as it requires confident
handling of conflicts, debates and contentions. India has recently made
Right to Education a fundamental right under which the quality of
teaching-learning process has been ensured. India is at the brink of
major reforms in school education under which teacher education has
been identified as the next key agenda of educational reform. This will
be especially relevant for SPL as it demands as dynamic and reflective
a teacher as the learners it envisages.







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