With Indian independence and coming of Indian Constitution; the foundations for progress in the society were laid. This was to be for an all out progress and the basis of this was the principles of scientific temper. This process was guided by the architect of modern India, Jawaharlal Nehru. We saw the surge of the institutions which contributed to the progress of the country; with great contributions of Indian scientists. There were flaws and weaknesses, of course, but the direction was a rational, direction was that of scientific approach. This fulfilled the clause of the Article 51a of the Indian constitution which enjoins upon citizens the “fundamental duty” to develop “the scientific temper”.
The Bharatiya Janata Party and its leaders, who are currently ruling and dictating the direction of scientific research and development, seem to have different ideas. While we have good foundations in all round areas of science and technology be it the area of basic science and technology, health, atomic energy, space science and what have you, it seems that currently direction being pursued by ruling dispensation is putting the things in the reverse gear.
During last seventy odd years the way our institutions have developed we can see their massive all round contribution in most areas of science and technology, though one can add, things could have been better. The inkling of this retrograde direction began with the previous BJP led NDA Government when Murali Manohar Joshi, the then MHRD minister introduced courses like astrology and Paurohitya (rituals) in Universities. In continuation with this pattern Dr. Satya Pal Singh, who is currently minster in MHRD, recently stated that Darwin’s theory is wrong as our ancestors did not mention that they saw ape turning into man in our scriptures. He was duly backed up by the RSS ideologue turned BJP leader Ram Madhav.
He himself a while ago he had stated that Wright brothers were not the first one’s to discover aero plane, it was and Indian, Shivkar Bapuji Talpade who had discovered it. He emphasized that such books should be taught in the schools which highlight the likes of Talpade. Theory of evolution has been one of the turning point discoveries of science, based on the painfully collected evidence by Darwin for a period of decades. As science is not based on faith there is always a scope to fill the gaps of knowledge of the original discoverer, and that’s how science develops. In contrast to the methods of science, the fundamentalists harp that all knowledge is already there in the Holy Scriptures, the word of almighty. Singh-Joshi-Ram Madhav clone is not the only ones’ in this retrograde thinking. The Christian fundamentalists went on to counter the theory of Darwin by putting together ‘Creation science’ and similarly Islamic fundamentalists like Zakir Naik also dismiss this theory on frivolous grounds.
Singh’s statement has been very disturbing for the scientific community in India. A large number of them expressed their anguish in a letter, which they sent to the Minister. The letter says that the minister’s statement was simplistic and misleading. “There is plentiful and undeniable scientific evidence to the fact that humans and the other great apes and monkeys had a common ancestor.” The letter further says that the minister’s claim that the Vedas contain answers to all questions is exaggerated and “is an insult to the genuine research work on history of Indian scientific traditions”.
“When a minister working for the human resource development in the country makes such claims, it harms the scientific community’s efforts to propagate scientific thoughts and rationality through critical education and modern scientific research,” reads the letter. “It also diminishes the image of the country at the global level and reduces faith of the international historical research community in the genuine research by the Indian researchers.”
At another level there are claims that Kauravas were born through the techniques mentioned in our holy scripture based on which Balkrishan Ganpat Matapurkar has patented the technique for body part generation, inspired by Gandhari’s giving birth to 100 sons and Karna taking birth from ear of Kunti. At equally interesting level is the understanding of the Chief of Indian Council of Historical Research, Y. Sudarshan. As per him reading of the Hindu epic Mahabharata can make us infer that the weapons described in them were the result of atomic fission and/or fusion. He also claims that stem cell research was there in Iron Age India.
It is not difficult to imagine that with this pattern of thinking among policy makers our science policy will get a strong jolt. Currently on most of issues the policy has been to encourage research and funding on topics, which are purely based on figments of imagination. Huge top level funding has recently been announced for Panchgavya, a mixture of cow urine, dung, ghee, curd and milk. The efforts to prove that Ram Setu (Adam’s bridge), bridge between India and Srilanka was for real and was built by Lord Ram with the help of Monkey army; are also on. In matters of History efforts are on to prove the existence of River Sarswati, to prove historicity of the epics like Ramayana and Mahabharata are among the few of them.
The twin processes involved here are to claim that all the knowledge is already there in our scriptures and that science-technology research and development should be along those lines. Second is to claim that all discoveries have their roots here in India, more so in India before the coming of Christians and Muslims. This seems to be running in parallel with identifying India with Hindus and Hinduism alone. One does feel that already during last many decades good foundation of scientific enterprises has been laid, the question is whether this community of scientists and Indian society at large will be able to resist these impositions on the march of direction of our science? Will our next generations be able to benefit from the rational thinking and achievements of science in coming times?
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Trouble ‘Miyas’ everywhere only then they will leave Assam: Himanta Biswa Sarma
Says “Himanta Biswa Sarma, BJP are openly against them, we are saying it openly
New Delhi: Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma on Tuesday said that four to five lakh “Miya voters” would be removed from the electoral rolls in the state once the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of voter lists is carried out. He also made a series of controversial remarks openly targeting the Miya community, a term commonly used in Assam in a derogatory sense to refer to Bengali-speaking Muslims.
Speaking to reporters on the sidelines of an official programme in Digboi in Tinsukia district, Sarma said it was his responsibility to create difficulties for the Miya community and claimed that both he and the BJP were “directly against Miyas”.
“Four to five lakh Miya votes will have to be deleted in Assam when the SIR happens,” Sarma said, adding that such voters “should ideally not be allowed to vote in Assam, but in Bangladesh”. He asserted that the government was ensuring that they would not be able to vote in the state.
The chief minister was responding to questions about notices issued to thousands of Bengali-speaking Muslims during the claims and objections phase of the ongoing Special Revision (SR) of electoral rolls in Assam. While the Election Commission is conducting SIR exercises in 12 states and Union Territories, Assam is currently undergoing an SR, which is usually meant for routine updates.
Calling the current SR “preliminary”, Sarma said that a full-fledged SIR in Assam would lead to large-scale deletion of Miya voters. He said he was unconcerned about criticism from opposition parties over the issue.
“Let the Congress abuse me as much as they want. My job is to make the Miya people suffer,” Sarma said. He claimed that complaints filed against members of the community were done on his instructions and that he had encouraged BJP workers to keep filing complaints.
“I have told people wherever possible they should fill Form 7 so that they have to run around a little and are troubled,” he said, adding that such actions were meant to send a message that “the Assamese people are still living”.
In remarks that drew further outrage, Sarma urged people to trouble members of the Miya community in everyday life, claiming that “only if they face troubles will they leave Assam”. He also accused the media of sympathising with the community and warned journalists against such coverage.
“So you all should also trouble, and you should not do news that sympathise with them. There will be love jihad in your own house.” He said.
The comments triggered reactions from opposition leaders. Raijor Dal president and MLA Akhil Gogoi said the people of Assam had not elected Sarma to keep one community under constant pressure. Congress leader Aman Wadud accused the chief minister of rendering the Constitution meaningless in the state, saying his remarks showed a complete disregard for constitutional values.
According to the draft electoral rolls published on December 27, Assam currently has 2.51 crore voters. Election officials said 4.78 lakh names were marked as deceased, 5.23 lakh as having shifted, and 53,619 duplicate entries were removed during the revision process. Authorities also claimed that verification had been completed for over 61 lakh households.
On January 25, six opposition parties the Congress, Raijor Dal, Assam Jatiya Parishad, CPI, CPI(M) and CPI(M-L) submitted a memorandum to the state’s chief electoral officer. They alleged widespread legal violations, political interference and selective targeting of genuine voters during the SR exercise, describing it as arbitrary, unlawful and unconstitutional.
