The soldiers of faith, who oppose scientific understanding, are simultaneously undermining both rational thought and the values of freedom, equality, and fraternity — dragging the nation backwards
ACROSS the globe, mythological narrations are filled with flights of imagination. We have been hearing them since our childhood and they all seem enchanting and have been etched in our memories forever. Yet, the fact remains that they are only a figment of imagination.
In the past few decades, however, a new trend has taken roots. In our country, right-wing ruling class has begun to present mythology as fact of life. The beginning of such claims from public fora was made by Prime Minister Narendra Modi himself, when he reminded doctors and the nation that plastic surgeons must have existed in ancient India — after all, how else could the head of an elephant child have been transplanted onto Lord Ganesha!
I do not intend to hurt anyone’s sentiments, but when I tried to understand this from a medical perspective and have concluded that such a procedure is impossible even today with so much scientific advancement. I also found out that there is a mention of deities with animal heads in Egyptian mythology too, but interestingly, the animal heads on Egyptian deities reflect their nature. For example, Sekhmet, the Egyptian goddess of war, has the head of a lioness, symbolising how fierce and terrifying she is. There are many such marvelous deities.
Equally fascinating is the fact that during General Zia-ul-Haq’s regime in Pakistan, it was suggested that jinns could be an inexhaustible source of energy. Serious discussions about this even took place in sessions of the Science Congress. Ideas such as a telecommunications network powered by jinns were presented. It was even claimed that the power of jinns could be harnessed to create missiles capable of evading radars. A new field of research, “jinn chemistry,” was born during General Zia-ul-Haq’s era, with claims that it had great potential for further development. In the 1970s, a director of Pakistan’s Atomic Energy Commission even proposed that instead of petrol, diesel, or nuclear fuel, the energy of jinns could be used. One hopes that Pakistan never truly implemented such mythological fantasies!
These stories come to mind because recently two senior BJP leaders made statements about space travel. On National Space Day, former Union Minister and current Lok Sabha member from Hamirpur in Himachal Pradesh Anurag Thakur asked school children who the first person to travel to space was. In unison, the children replied, “Neil Armstrong.” Thakur responded, “No, that’s not correct. The right answer is Lord Hanuman.” He went on to insist that teachers look “beyond the textbooks prepared by the British” and instead “turn to the Vedas, our scriptures, and our knowledge.” He cited the tale in which Lord Hanuman flew across the skies and brought back the mountain carrying the life-saving herb.
Similarly, Union Agriculture Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan declared that long before the Wright brothers, Orville and Wilbur, invented the airplane, the Pushpak Vimana already existed. Remarkable! Anyone with a basic understanding of science knows the kind of technology required to build a flying machine. The dream of flying has been with humankind for millennia. Scientists worked tirelessly in laboratories and in the field, sweating and experimenting, to turn that dream into reality.
It is hard to say for certain whether these dignitaries truly believe in presenting mythology as reality, or whether they do so simply to devalue scientific reasoning.
Not stopping there, Chouhan also claimed that during the Mahabharata period, India was technologically advanced. According to him, “The drones and missiles we have today already existed thousands of years ago — we have read all this in the Mahabharata.”
It almost seems like there is a competition to make ever more grandiose claims about the past. Ever since Modi began portraying mythological tales as science, various BJP leaders have been making similar assertions — that modern technological achievements already existed in ancient India. For instance, the then Gujarat chief minister Vijay Rupani once said that “Narad was like Google, a source of information.”
According to a report in The Tribune, on April 17, 2018, former Tripura Chief Minister Biplab Kumar Deb claimed, “The Internet has been used in India since ancient times. In the Mahabharata, Sanjay gave King Dhritarashtra a live account of the battlefield. This was only possible because of the Internet. Satellites, too, existed in those times.”
Former Union Minister of Science and Technology Dr Harsh Vardhan, himself a doctor, declared on March 16, 2018, that “every Hindu custom is steeped in science, and every modern achievement is linked to ancient scientific discoveries.” These are just a few pearls of wisdom shared by BJP leaders. All of this runs counter to the very foundation of scientific reasoning on which modern Indian scientific institutions were built. It is chilling to imagine what would have happened if, immediately after Independence, people with such an ideology had been in power and had made policies based on such beliefs.
In the early decades after Independence, many scientific institutions were established in India, which led to the training of scientists and the beginning of research.
Why then do BJP’s ruling leaders present mythological imagination as scientific fact? The answer lies in the current dominance of faith-based knowledge and thinking in the country. We live in an environment where godmen are revered, and the past is glorified. Knowledge evolves gradually, transcending national borders. Ancient India made remarkable contributions to science — think of Aryabhata, Sushruta, and many others who enriched the treasury of knowledge. This process went hand in hand with the development of society.
Throughout human history, faith and rational thought have often clashed. Conservative forces in society cling to faith-based understanding, while forces of change, equality, and opposition to injustice champion rational knowledge and scientific thought. The ideology of the BJP and the Sangh Parivar is fundamentally rooted in social values of inequality. The Indian Constitution, on the other hand, gives us the opportunity to bring about social change in the direction of equality and also emphasises the importance of scientific temper. The Sangh Parivar, including the BJP, looks backward and, in many ways, opposes both scientific reasoning and the Indian Constitution.
Political ideologies come as a package deal. The Indian Constitution, which upholds scientific temper, is aligned with ideas of social change. In contrast, Hindu nationalist ideology seeks to reverse the vision that was achieved during the freedom struggle and enshrined in the Constitution. The soldiers of faith, who oppose scientific understanding, are simultaneously undermining both rational thought and the values of freedom, equality, and fraternity — dragging the nation backwards.
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Ram Puniyani is an eminent author, activist and a former professor at IIT Mumbai. The views expressed here are author’s personal and Clarion India does not necessarily share or subscribe to them.
