A textbook released six months into the academic year. A sceptre installed in Parliament. And historians who say the official version of events simply doesn’t hold up. The NCERT Sengol controversy has all the ingredients of a proper political and academic fight — and it’s not going away anytime soon.
Here’s what’s actually going on.
What NCERT’s New Textbook Claims
The Class 9 Social Science textbook, released this September under the title Understanding Society: India and Beyond – Part 2, contains a detailed account of the Sengol — a gold-plated sceptre with roots in Tamil Shaivite tradition — being presented to Jawaharlal Nehru at midnight on August 14-15, 1947.
The textbook frames this as a deeply significant moment — a “cultural marker of rulership and good governance” that symbolised the transfer of power from British hands to an independent India. It traces the Sengol’s origins to the Chola empire and draws a line from that ancient tradition straight to the 2023 ceremony where Prime Minister Modi installed the same sceptre inside the new Lok Sabha chamber.
It also notes — and this is where several academics raised their eyebrows — that rulers like Chhatrapati Shivaji were “believed to have” received swords from deities. Critics have asked why a secular social science textbook for 14-year-olds is weaving in religious mythology alongside historical fact without clearly distinguishing between the two.
What Historians Actually Say
The academic pushback has been pointed, and it comes from people who’ve spent their careers studying this exact period.
Historian Aditya Mukherjee, who specialises in India’s freedom movement, has said he could find no credible historical evidence that the Sengol served as anything more than a ceremonial gift from a religious institution to Nehru. The idea that it formally represented the transfer of power, he argues, appears to be a modern reinterpretation — one that reads contemporary political symbolism back into 1947.
Then there’s Rajmohan Gandhi — C. Rajagopalachari’s own grandson and his authorised biographer — who made perhaps the most striking statement. The government’s version of the Sengol story has Nehru asking Rajagopalachari to suggest a ceremony to mark the transfer of power, with “Rajaji” then arranging for the Sengol to be crafted. Rajmohan Gandhi has stated clearly that he never encountered this account in any of his research. That’s not a minor quibble — this is the man who spent years reading his grandfather’s private papers and correspondence.
Why the Timing Matters
The textbook wasn’t released at the start of the school year. It came out in September — six months after students had already begun studying. That itself is unusual and has led to questions about whether there was a rush to include this content.
The political backdrop is impossible to ignore. The Sengol’s installation in Parliament in 2023 was one of the most discussed — and contested — moments of Modi’s second term. Critics called it an attempt to replace the colonial-era ceremonial mace with a symbol rooted in Hindu religious tradition. Supporters called it a restoration of India’s own cultural heritage.
Including the Sengol in a school curriculum now cements that narrative for the next generation — which is precisely why historians are pushing back so hard.
What Students Are Actually Being Taught
The deeper concern for many educators isn’t just historical accuracy — it’s the method. When a textbook presents a contested historical interpretation alongside established fact, without clearly flagging the difference, students have no way to evaluate what they’re reading.
A 14-year-old reading that the Sengol “symbolised the transfer of power” will likely take that as settled history. That it’s actively disputed by credible historians — including the grandson of one of the people supposedly involved — won’t be obvious from the text itself.
Several teachers and educators have written to NCERT asking for the basis of the claims to be made transparent and for contested interpretations to be clearly labelled as such.
NCERT’s Response
NCERT has so far not issued a detailed response to the specific historical objections raised. Officials have generally defended the textbook revision process as thorough and academically rigorous, though they haven’t addressed the specific claims that historians have disputed.
This controversy is unlikely to settle quietly. With board exams approaching and the textbook already in students’ hands, the pressure on NCERT to either clarify or revise its claims is only going to increase.
