Toon panel goes goofy

Don’t laugh. Education is serious business. It’s not entertainment, sweetie, so don’t even think of enjoying it. And thank god the expert panel set up by the government is there to save you from yourself.

Headed by Sukhdeo Thorat, chairman of ICSSR (Indian Council of Social Science Research), the panel of experts was set up primarily to check out cartoons and other strange stuff in NCERT social science textbooks for older school students. And it has demanded that more than 40 cartoons, comments or questions be deleted or modified.
The cartoon panel’s report is bristling with objections — it doesn’t want any ambiguity, any politically sensitive discussion, or politicians, bureaucrats or institutions depicted in an “incorrect” way. Cartoons should convey a “positive message” to students, it demands focus on themes rather than personalities, and be “tested” on students before being included in texts. Besides, instead of reprinting cartoons from newspapers and advertisements, new ones should be created strictly for educational purposes. Whew! Maybe create a special classroom language too, strictly for educational purposes?
Naturally, the much-talked-about Ambedkar-Nehru-Constitution cartoon by Shankar that started it all, and R.K. Laxman’s cartoon on the anti-Hindi agitation by Tamils, were fit for instant deletion. Here are a few of the many more the panel wants out:
w An R.K. Laxman cartoon showing a beggar with a begging bowl popping out of the trophy labelled “massive support” held by a surprised Indira Gandhi (because it is “politically sensitive”)
w A Shankar cartoon called “Kicking upstairs” showing Nehru giving a kick to send a politician up into a building labelled “Governorship” (because of “a sense of ambiguity”)
w A 1950s R.K. Laxman cartoon showing Nehru urging two monkeys representing France and Portugal to leave Pondicherry and Goa with the words: “I admit years back you were living happily right here when this was all a colonial jungle… but we’ve cleared it now and built a decent house! So you must quit!” (because “no politician or institution may be represented as animals”.)
w A cartoon from the US called “One-Party Country” showing a big fat piggish tycoon with the Senate, presidency and Supreme Court as baby elephants in his pockets (because “politicians and institutions are represented as animals.”)
w A Surendra cartoon suggesting that the bureaucracy was blocking the RTI, represented by a choked tubewell inaugurated grandly by the Prime Minister (because “it is not a correct interpretation of the role of the bureaucracy.”)
w An R.K. Laxman cartoon showing an aide telling a politician who has covered his face on seeing press photographers: “Forget that old habit and face the camera! Remember you have been nominated and are standing for election now!” (because “it stereotypes all politicians as being criminals.”)
w A cartoon by Manjul showing a politician declaring her assets of `50 crore being told: “You already have so much money. Why do you want to contest the elections?” (because “it does not convey any message, besides it is too crude.”)
And there are many more where these came from. All deemed unfit for student consumption, all reflecting “incorrect” ways of representing social realities to teenagers.
What the panel considers “correct” comes out in the report’s whiplash on a cartoon about two Emergency-era notions. The cartoon comments: “Put simply, committed judiciary and committed bureaucracy means that the judges and officers should be loyal to the ruling party. What a pity!” The panel wants “What a pity!” removed. So does it want students to be taught that a committed judiciary and committed bureaucracy should be committed to the ruling party? And no questions or comments, thank you? That curiously callous — or undemocratic, unacademic and self-destructive — line of thought is the real pity.
The panel says we must not use animals to tell a story about the human condition. In effect, it is banishing all fables and fairytales from the mindspace of students. Let’s just stick to feeding our 14 to 18-year-olds crude, one dimensional, soft and easily digestible baby pap. For a healthy mind and strong intellect, let’s spare them from thinking, let their textbooks offer the straight and narrow in a generic, infantile, politically correct way.
The cartoon panel opposes ambiguity too. So should we banish all literature? “Politics tends to be ideological, religion tends to be dogmatic, but literature is always ambiguous,” said Carlos Fuentes. Ambiguity is the lifeline of creativity, it keeps literature alive, makes art and music vibrant. Ambiguity is the well that nurtures moral philosophy. In a sense, ambiguity is the essence of human creativity and ethics. And these experts want to shield our students from it.
Social scientists have strongly argued against the destructive, authoritative desire to remove ambiguity from our worlds. In a democracy one seeks ways of balancing opposing ideas, clashing notions and different identities, rather than attempting to paint everyone with the same brush.
These textbooks had attempted to embrace the pedagogical method in education. Simply put, the pedagogical method embraces a holistic approach of educating, where the student is encouraged to think, and figure out answers for herself, with the help of some information and the teacher’s systematic, prodding questions. It is sort of like the way Socrates taught his pupils.
But the cartoon panel seems to prefer the age-old, boring, top-down method. It is desperate to protect us from our critical thoughts. Because “in a society as vast and as diverse as India is, there can always be room for different understanding of the text and interpretation of visuals, and especially cartoons could be viewed differently by different segments of society.” What the cartoon panel fails to notice is that by the very act of lampooning all these serious institutions and respected politicians, the cartoons prove how strong and tolerant India was, and is, as a free democracy. By instructing textbooks to remove these cartoons, the cartoon panel is proving how intolerant we are becoming.
And by demanding that only made-to-order cartoons “strictly for educational purpose” be included in textbooks, and not cartoons reprinted from publications, proves how narrow this panel’s outlook is. A holistic education involves knowing the pulse of the times — which is reflected best in the sepia-toned cartoons that were actually out there, reflecting the prevalent mood of the people, perhaps shaping the thoughts of decision-makers.
How long will we attempt to protect young India from our multi-coloured, multi-textured, immensely powerful realities? And do we really need such a goofy cartoon panel?