Vidyarthi cha jeevanam patati

The National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT) came under fire for covering the torso of the famous Mohenjo-daro "Dancing Girl" figurine. In the opening chapter of the new Class 9 arts education textbook, Madhurima, digital shading was added cover the 4,000-year-old bronze sculpture.

Michel Danino, the former head of the Class 6 Social Science textbook committee, told that the council members were concerned that the statue could be "controversial" for younger students due to its bareness. Danino strongly opposed the move. He's been accused of engaging in "Hindutva pseudo-history" himself.

Following public backlash, the NCERT reversed its decision. Director Dinesh Saklani announced that NCERT is restoring the altered image with the original version across both digital and print editions of the textbook. Saklani publicly distanced himself from the direct approval of the edit. He stated to the press that he was "not aware of any specific reason behind the change" and immediately redirected the media attention by sending the book back to the internal art education department for a mandatory review. The final push came from the Union Education Ministry, which officially demanded a formal explanation from NCERT hours after the media exposed the altered image. This pressure from the ministry bypassed internal committee approvals and forced the council to immediately restore the original.

Then who was behind the team making Madhurima, and who was behind the approval of digital alteration? NCERT has kept the specific designer and approval records private, but here's what's publicly available information: the digital alteration originated within the NCERT Department of Arts Education (DAE) and its assigned textbook development committee for Madhurima. The individual editor, who applied the digital shading, remains anonymous, the DAE panel as a collective body drafted and finalized the chapter content. The actual digital shading in Madhurima was executed under the purview of the team designing the Arts curriculum. This team is headed by Sandhya Purecha, who serves as the chairperson of the Sangeet Natak Akademi. She is an internationally acclaimed Bharatanatyam dancer, author, and researcher. Her work focuses heavily on ancient Sanskrit texts like the Natyashastra and the Abhinaya Darpanam. While the exact internal author of the edit has not been publicly named by NCERT, accountability for content layout and modifications in this specific book falls under her development team. Now, I believe that she wasn't overlooking this decision, it is possible she had no idea. The committee heads don't personally write or draft the textbook material. Instead, textbook creation is delegated to independent committees. Some of these committee head positions are nominal, like the position of Sudha Murthy for example. It is entirely possible that an ideologically motivated person made the alteration and that this alteration bypassed all internal scrutiny until the people noticed this alteration. We don't know who this ideologically motivated person is, and we can only take Danino's words as speculation, until NCERT becomes transparent with their audits. 

Yes, because the Washington state government activated like a sleeper-cell and ruthlessly, systematically hunted them down and annihilated them.

“Y2K came to nothing amirite?”

Yes because an army of software engineers working around the clock, losing sleep, and busting ass till the last minute prevented it from happening.

“Remember the hole in the ozone layer?”

You mean the one that was fixed through rigorous world wide government action?

One of the root problems of our society is a refusal or inability by media to articulate that all those “it’s gonna be an apocalypse” disasters were not disasters because we collectively did something about them.

The good news is this is actually quite correctable. I maintain my firm belief that we as humans are capable of solving almost all of our problems, when we decide to do so.

And I still think that’s going to happen. I don’t know when or how, but I do know that abandoning hope won’t help bring it about.

Um, first of all, Sati's entire story is based on her making her own choices, and going against her father's. She decides that she wants to marry Shiva, and hence does tapasya to do so. She marries Shiva even when Daksha isn't really keen for the marriage. She takes Shiva to her father's yajna, and later on goes there again even when her husband isn't really keen on her going there. Sati gives up her life as per her choice, because she is too disgusted by her father. She literally lived her life on her own terms, not her husband's, and certainly not her father's. What part of that is giving "sanskaari" to you? And by sanskaari yall know what I mean, the standards society has imposed upon women.

And then, we have Sita, another woman making her own choices. She is not a docile, forever-crying, submissive princess. Sita marries Rama in a viryashulka ceremony so yes, this is somewhat of an arranged marriage, however, she chooses to go to exile with Rama. Everyone, from her husband to her in-laws were not in favour of her going to the forest, and yet she goes, solely because she wants to. She wants to be with her husband. When Hanuman comes to rescue her, she refuses to leave with him, because she wants Rama to come and take her back. When Rama expresses hesitance to take her back home with him (not because he doubts her, but because he knows that people will), Sita takes it as a rejection and decides that she will enter the fire. It is her own decision, not one imposed on her by anyone else. She too, is living her life on her own terms.

Xie Zheng knows that Fan Changyu would love him as a Yan "Worm" Zheng, she would build him a whole worm habitat and butcher pigs to support him, that is not his problem.

He needs to know if Fan Changyu will still love him as a dragon. As one of the deadliest, most competent, and powerful people in the kingdom.

He pretended to be a worm for so so long so she would keep taking care of him.

He's half a moment of despair away from chopping off his arms and legs to turn back into a worm.

(Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal by Zach Weinersmith)

obligatory tattoo artist x florist AU

Irony isn't it, that Margot Robbie remembered to constantly mention that the diamond "belonged" to Elizabeth Taylor and kept saying that before Elizabeth it belonged to a "woman" who is buried in Taj Mahal.

This necklace was originally gifted by Jahangir to his wife Noor Jahan which has the inscription "love is everlasting, Noor Jahan Begum Badshah" and later it was passed to Shah Jahan who gifted it to Mumtaz Mahal. When the Britishers looted India, they took the necklace too and somehow it ended up in Cartier and then it was purchased by Richard Button for his wife Elizabeth Taylor. And Cartier gave it to her to wear for her movie premiere.