The Hidden Propaganda: How a ‘liberal’ education almost made me hate Rama for half my life.
I read a chapter in my history textbook in school stating that Rama asked his wife Sita to undergo a “test of purity”. At that age, I didn’t fully understand what it meant. But my teacher interpreted it for us saying that Rama objectified his wife, abandoned her because Ravana had violated her, & that he chose power and prestige over love.
That explanation planted a subtle yet deep-rooted dislike for Rama in my young mind.
Ironically, I had watched Ramayan on DD as a toddler but I never revisited it later.
I didn’t even grow up in an atheist household. My home & heart were filled with devotion towards other representations of the divine, Krishna, Shiva, and Durga... Yet somehow I almost ended up hating Rama.
Sometimes even wondering if the casual labeling of the story of Rama as “mythology” instead of “History”, was true.
Years later, I became deeply devoted to Hanuman. And that’s when a strange contradiction began to trouble me. I loved Hanuman, but I despised Rama. It didn’t make sense. What made Hanuman so devoted to someone I had come to dislike so strongly?
But I never questioned this one thing I had been taught. I never asked my parents. Somewhere in my mind, there was no doubt that what I learned in school had to be true.
Events like the Babri Masjid demolition further reinforced my bias. I began associating Rama with conflict, with controversy, with something negative.
I studied in a convent. As a millennial, I idolized Barkha Dutt, Rajdeep Sardesai and even Ravish (lmao when i think of it now) and thought i was “educating” myself listening to the insightful prime time debates on the then erstwhile Pronoy Roy led NDTV.
I hated Modi, everything saffron, believed in the Hindu terror stories, and the narratives around the “Ganga-Jamuni Tehzeeb” that were sold to us on a platter. But I thought Tipu Sultan, Akbar and his kin were great rulers!!
The constant framing of anything related to Hindu identity in a negative light slowly influenced how I perceived Hindutva & Sanatan.
And this brings me to a larger point, the woke-fication of the Indian education system and media. It genuinely infuriates me to think that young minds can be shaped so deeply by feeding misinformation.
Who is accountable for this? Shouldn’t there be consequences for shaping generations with misinformation through History Books, Movies, News and Media? …impacting identity, belief systems, and cultural connection at a very fundamental level.
It feels like an entire generation of liberal millennials like myself was subtly shaped by these narratives. And now, as some of these narratives are being exposed, there is an immediate push to label the more accurate perspectives as “propaganda.” My condolences therefore with the likes who still side with the Tukde Tukde gang…
I wonder where the likes of J Sai Deepak, A Ranganathan and Satguru were while I was growing up feeding on the shit that the left liberals were serving on prime time. My bad. I didn’t question and inquire. Years later this video answered the question that had always bothered me https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ehc8Kshvsfs.
The narrative needs to be set right for sure. Movies like the Kerala - Kashmir - Bengal Files, the Dhurandhar series … are just one of the means. I just wish it had happened sooner. The not so desi version of the Ramayana... i hope works on those lines too.
Maybe Aditya Dhar & Co should also explore this for their next. I’m no authority on the topic, but the insights are startling, if actually true.