NCERT Reduces Content For Class 6 In New Textbook - Vedas, Puranas, Upanishads Added

The new Social Science textbook for Class 6, titled Exploring Society - India and Beyond, merges what were previously three separate NCERT books on History, Geography, and Civics into one heavily truncated volume.

This change aligns with the National Syllabus and Teaching Learning Material Committee's considerations reported earlier by The Hindu newspaper.

Photo Credit: PTI

For the 2024-25 academic year, students in Class 3 and Class 6 will receive new textbooks. The Class 6 Social Science book includes a chapter (Chapter 5: India, that is Bharat) dedicated to exploring the etymology of the term "Bharat," referencing ancient Indian texts like the Mahabharata and the Vishnu Purana.

The chapter states, "Interestingly, it lists many regions, such as Kāshmīra (more or less today's Kashmir), Kurukṣhetra (parts of Haryana today), Vanga (parts of Bengal), Prāgjyotiṣha (roughly today's Assam), Kaccha (today's Kutch), Kerala (more or less today's Kerala), and so on." The text includes Sanskrit terms with diacritics to aid proper pronunciation.

The book is divided into five themes. The first theme, covering Geography, is condensed into 34 pages, down from the previous 48, and includes chapters on Oceans and Continents and Landforms and Life, starting with a quote from the Atharva Veda. Topics such as measuring longitude and latitude have been removed.

The second and third themes, titled 'Tapestry of the Past' and 'Our Cultural Heritage and Knowledge Traditions', span 46 pages and contain five History chapters, reduced from ten in the older version.

Chapter 4 covers 'Timeline and Sources of History', and Chapter 5 discusses the origins of the term 'Bharat'.

Chapter 6, 'The Beginning of Indian Civilisation,' includes a quote from the late B.B. Lal, a former ASI chief, who had varying opinions on the presence of a Hindu temple at the Babri Masjid site over the years. Lal is quoted referring to the Harappan civilisation as the Indus-Sarasvati or Sindhu-Sarasvati civilisation. The chapter now features Dholavira, a Harappan site in Gujarat, replacing the previous cover image of Mohenjodaro.

Chapter 7, 'India's Cultural Roots,' expands on the Vedas and now includes stories from the 'Katha Upanishad' and the 'Brihadaranyaka Upanishad', in addition to the 'Chhandogya Upanishad' story from the old textbook. An 18th-century painting from the Ramayana is also included.

The new textbook significantly reduces content on ancient Indian kingdoms. Detailed accounts of the Maurya, Gupta, Pallava, and Chalukya dynasties, including figures like Ashoka and Chanakya, have been removed. King Ashoka is now only mentioned briefly in a timeline in Chapter 4. Content on villages, towns, trade, and artifacts like the iron pillar at Qutub Minar, Sanchi stupa, Mahabalipuram temples, and Ajanta cave paintings have also been truncated.

The fourth theme addresses governance and democracy, focusing on local governance, while the fifth theme covers economics.

In the introductory chapter, NCERT director Dinesh Saklani explains the rationale behind the changes.

"We have tried to keep the text to a minimum by focusing on the 'big ideas'. This has enabled us to combine in a single theme inputs from several disciplines - whether history, geography, political science or economics," he said.