In 2018, the then Union Minister of Human Resource Development, Satyapal Singh, called Darwin’s theory of evolution “scientifically wrong” and asked that it be removed from Indian school and college curricula. The next year, the Vice-Chancellor of Andhra University, Nageswara Rao Gollapalli, made a claim at the 106th Indian Science Congress, that the “theory of Dashavatara” explains evolution better than Darwin’s theory.
Both instances spurred sufficient controversy. However, little did we know that Mr. Singh’s statement also demonstrated clairvoyance.
The National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT) dropped Darwin’s theory from the examination syllabus for Class 9 and 10 students in the academic year 2021-22. In a development this year, the NCERT has now dropped the entire section on evolution from its Class 10 textbooks.
