During my school days I always had a feeling that studying history was an absolute waste of time and we rather could've had 2 science classes instead of a history or a geography class! After all, everyone needs a decent score in Physics, Chemistry and Maths/Biology to get into a professional course. So why care about history? But now, I realize the mistake I made in assessing the value of History! History offers something that no other subject can offer - experience. Where else do we get to learn from the mistakes of the losers and improvise on the characters of a winner? Perhaps a better history teacher would've created better interest in the subject but unfortunately all history teachers I had in my school days were middle class home makers who had to work for their economical stability and there were so many classes to handle and too many students to attend to. So they can't be blamed but the cause of my disinterest pretty much laid there...
Even today I'm not an expert in any kind of history but one thing that I could conclusively say is that Indian history has been messed up to a great extent and even worse - no initiative has been taken to improvise the information contained. I can point out several instances where History has been proven wrong right from Gandhi uttering the words 'Hey Ram' when he was shot to the latest findings on Taj Mahal that reveal the diligent efforts put forth in converting it into a tomb. (Refer to http://www.stephen-knapp.com/was_the_taj_mahal_a_vedic_temple.htm for more details.) But it'd indeed be controversial and I don't prefer that either! If that is one part of it, there is another portion of untold history like the scientific analysis of the past virtues. For instance, I was amazed when my friend told me the acoustic specialties of Golkonda fort. Despite my interest in History, I've never come across this fact in any book! The very sense of superiority and pride that these kinds of facts instill in a young mind is incomparable and rather than studying chapters and chapters on the battles that went between the Indian rulers and mugging up the years they happened, equal importance should also be given to the contributions from the emperors in various fields along with their scientific background. Further, efforts need to be taken to ensure that the history that a child learns is accurate and transparent as opposed to some story that underwent innumerable revisions. That is the only way the child can realize the importance of history, understand the ugly transformation from scientists to observers, sense the patriotism in him/her and cherish the learnings for a life time.
3 comments:
it is true to some extent that the history that we read in our school is interpolated...but the research which says that Taj Mahal was a Siva temple must be a crap...I don't know about the acoustic specialities of Golkonda fort, but we have many such unsung special things all over our country...our ancestors have done a great mistake of not recording them properly in annals...
Indian history is not manipulated to some extent rather it is manipulated to a very great extent.
Why do you think that the research on Taj is a crap? Did you look at the evidences listed?
Golkonda fort has a lot of acoustic specialties. http://www.south-india-tour-package.com/south-india-monuments/monuments-in-andhra-pradesh/golconda-fort.html talks about one aspect of it.
Ancestors need not make any notes maappu... These structures are still there and people who visited Golkonda fort would know all this. But still these are not a part of our history!
wikipedia is my history source these days... Elegant is the word for its flow
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