With so many more serious problems in the country, the covered up image of the world famous Dancing Girl of Mohenjo-daro was perhaps less of a major issue.
But it was so ridiculous that the news that the National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT) had obscured a photograph of the statue in its latest textbooks quickly went viral globally. It did not show India in a good light.
Thankfully, the covered up image has been withdrawn from the textbooks after it sparked a massive backlash from historians and educationists.
The bronze sculpture – known as the Dancing Girl from Mohenjo-daro – shows a girl standing with one hand on her hip adorned with ornaments and her hair tied in a bun. It is one of the most recognisable artefacts from the Indus Valley civilisation.
But in a newly released Class 9 textbook, the figurine’s torso was covered with dark shading, hiding its anatomical features.
After it created an uproar, officials said that the original image has been restored in the digital version of the book and that new print editions would also carry the unedited photo of the bronze sculpture.
Historians accused NCERT, which drafted the textbook, of disfiguring the iconic artefact.
A chapter on the Indus Valley has been a staple in the school curriculum and the Dancing Girl sculpture has appeared in textbooks for decades, including in earlier versions of NCERT textbooks, but its torso has never been censored in any way.
Why that had to change now is not clear as NCERT has not yet shared a reason for introducing the modified image. The speculation, though, is that it could be due to concerns over nudity.
Nude art is not a rarity in Indian, or world, civilisation, even in more prudish times.
The textbook is part of a new Arts Education Series, introduced under the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 to integrate visual, performing and literary arts into mainstream schooling.
The Dancing Girl’s posture captures the human body in motion and archaeologists consider the sculpture to be of incredible artistic value and evidence of the Indus Valley civilisation’s advanced knowledge of metallurgy.
Unless the alteration of an historical artistic object is done for reconstruction, any such changes result in a fake artefact. This suggests a complete lack of understanding of how historical objects are to be pictured.
NCERT textbooks have made mistakes before and there will be errors again. Previous instances have been genuine blunders or problems in the way the subject matter has been presented. This is especially true with historical subjects, as the Hindutva-obsessed BJP has been pushing for less time and space given to Muslim ruling dynasties and other ‘foreigners’. But here is an example of censorship not sparing even subjects from our great and glorious pre-Islamic past. At least the insult to the Dancing Girl lasted just a short while before the authorities ditched their ill-thought out cover up.
