NCERT drops Mughal decline and Tipu Sultan from new history textbooks under NEP 2020
Middle-school students will now encounter a reworked narrative of early modern India, particularly the Mughal period, where key chapters, tables, and episodes have been removed or reframed
- Aug 16, 2025,
- Updated Aug 16, 2025 12:02 PM IST
The NCERT’s latest textbooks under the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 and the National Curriculum Framework for School Education (NCF-SE) 2023 have undergone sweeping changes, with history lessons seeing some of the most visible restructuring. Middle-school students will now encounter a reworked narrative of early modern India, particularly the Mughal period, where key chapters, tables, and episodes have been removed or reframed.
In the revised Class 8 volume Exploring Society: India and Beyond, the section tracing the decline of the Mughal empire after Aurangzeb’s death in 1707 has been deleted. Instead, the book moves directly into British colonial expansion, leaving out the transitional decades of Maratha, Afghan, and regional struggles.
The pruning is visible across grades. In Class 7, a two-page table of Mughal emperors and their policies has been dropped. At the senior-secondary level, Class 12 no longer contains “Theme 9: Kings and Chronicles, The Mughal Courts,” which earlier examined imperial administration, court culture, and Persian chronicling traditions.
NCERT officials say the exercise is part of a “rationalisation” drive to reduce curriculum overload. They stress that Mughal history continues to be covered elsewhere in Class 7 and in one surviving Class 12 chapter. The intent, they argue, is “streamlining,” not erasure.
Yet, critics point to significant omissions. References to Tipu Sultan, Haidar Ali, and the Anglo-Mysore Wars, once cited as examples of resistance to the East India Company in southern India, are no longer part of the Class 8 text. The changes were flagged in Parliament, where the government responded that states retain the discretion to include regional episodes in their own curricula.
The Mughal chapters that remain have been reframed in tone. Babur is presented as “ruthless” in conquest, Akbar’s reign as a mix of accommodation and coercion, and Aurangzeb as a ruler noted for “religious intolerance.” A footnote marked “No-Blame” instructs students to focus on context rather than pass moral judgment.
Officials say this thematic turn aligns with NEP 2020’s call for critical engagement rather than rote learning. Chronological sweep has given way to thematic clusters where students are encouraged to interrogate cause-and-effect relationships, cultural interplay, and historical contingencies.
The restructuring has sparked debate. Curriculum designers argue that lighter, sharper syllabi are necessary to reduce overlap and ease student load. Historians and educators counter that selective omissions deprive students of the full arc of India’s composite past — a “missing middle” where the leap from Mughal decline to British dominance skips critical decades of transition.
For now, the revised Class 8 history textbook stands as a marker of the NEP’s approach: tighter syllabi, sharper thematic focus, and recalibrated historical emphasis. Whether it sets the template for other subjects or remains a contested experiment will depend on classroom uptake and the pushback that follows.
The NCERT’s latest textbooks under the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 and the National Curriculum Framework for School Education (NCF-SE) 2023 have undergone sweeping changes, with history lessons seeing some of the most visible restructuring. Middle-school students will now encounter a reworked narrative of early modern India, particularly the Mughal period, where key chapters, tables, and episodes have been removed or reframed.
In the revised Class 8 volume Exploring Society: India and Beyond, the section tracing the decline of the Mughal empire after Aurangzeb’s death in 1707 has been deleted. Instead, the book moves directly into British colonial expansion, leaving out the transitional decades of Maratha, Afghan, and regional struggles.
The pruning is visible across grades. In Class 7, a two-page table of Mughal emperors and their policies has been dropped. At the senior-secondary level, Class 12 no longer contains “Theme 9: Kings and Chronicles, The Mughal Courts,” which earlier examined imperial administration, court culture, and Persian chronicling traditions.
NCERT officials say the exercise is part of a “rationalisation” drive to reduce curriculum overload. They stress that Mughal history continues to be covered elsewhere in Class 7 and in one surviving Class 12 chapter. The intent, they argue, is “streamlining,” not erasure.
Yet, critics point to significant omissions. References to Tipu Sultan, Haidar Ali, and the Anglo-Mysore Wars, once cited as examples of resistance to the East India Company in southern India, are no longer part of the Class 8 text. The changes were flagged in Parliament, where the government responded that states retain the discretion to include regional episodes in their own curricula.
The Mughal chapters that remain have been reframed in tone. Babur is presented as “ruthless” in conquest, Akbar’s reign as a mix of accommodation and coercion, and Aurangzeb as a ruler noted for “religious intolerance.” A footnote marked “No-Blame” instructs students to focus on context rather than pass moral judgment.
Officials say this thematic turn aligns with NEP 2020’s call for critical engagement rather than rote learning. Chronological sweep has given way to thematic clusters where students are encouraged to interrogate cause-and-effect relationships, cultural interplay, and historical contingencies.
The restructuring has sparked debate. Curriculum designers argue that lighter, sharper syllabi are necessary to reduce overlap and ease student load. Historians and educators counter that selective omissions deprive students of the full arc of India’s composite past — a “missing middle” where the leap from Mughal decline to British dominance skips critical decades of transition.
For now, the revised Class 8 history textbook stands as a marker of the NEP’s approach: tighter syllabi, sharper thematic focus, and recalibrated historical emphasis. Whether it sets the template for other subjects or remains a contested experiment will depend on classroom uptake and the pushback that follows.