In a pointed critique, Rashtriya Janata Dal parliamentarian Manoj Jha urged viewing history through the lens of its era, targeting the latest NCERT Class 8 textbook revisions that mention judicial corruption and reshape the 1947 Partition story.
During an IANS interview, Jha recalled how Gandhi and key leaders resisted Partition amid escalating violence and chaos. ‘Decisions were made under duress,’ he explained. ‘Hindsight judgments ignore the brutal realities faced by Congress-led freedom fighters.’
NCERT’s new edition acknowledges the opposition from Gandhi and Congress but frames their eventual acceptance as pragmatic.
Turning to politics, Jha decried the arrest and ‘mastermind’ tag on Youth Congress chief Uday Bhanu Chib over AI Impact Summit protests. Drawing parallels to high-profile unsolved cases—Red Fort, Pahalgam, Pulwama—he questioned the haste. ‘Why pinpoint a mastermind here but not there? Government must rethink this.’
Jha lambasted Bihar’s non-veg sales ban near schools and temples, likening Deputy CM Vijay Sinha’s tactics to Giriraj Singh’s divisive model. India’s tapestry of traditions demands nuance, he argued, pointing to his village’s temple-school proximity with ritual sacrifices. ‘Stunt politics for publicity harms us all—time for broader vision.’
His words underscore a call for contextual empathy in education and governance.