Sociology Project - Scientific Temper

DR.
RAM MANOHAR LOHIYA NATIONAL LAW UNIVERSITY
PROJECTDD
BA.LL.B.(Hons.), 3rd Semester, 2018 - 2023
Subject: - Sociology
Project on: - The Shrinking Space for Scientific

Temper in India Is Worrying
SUBMITTED TO: - SUBMITTED BY:

Dr. Sanjay Singh
Professor Enrollment No.
Sociology 3rd Semester
R.M.L.N.L.U B.A.LL.B (Hons.)

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
I express my gratitude and deep regards to my teacher for the subject Dr. Sanjay Singh Sir for
giving me such a challenging topic and also for his exemplary guidance, monitoring and
constant encouragement throughout the course of this thesis.
I also take this opportunity to express a deep sense of gratitude to my seniors in the college for
their cordial support, valuable information and guidance, which helped me in completing this
task through various stages.
I am obliged to the staff members of the Madhu Limaye Library, for the timely and valuable
information provided by them in their respective fields. I am grateful for their cooperation
during the period of my assignment.
Lastly, I thank almighty, my family and friends for their constant encouragement
without which this assignment would not have been possible.

Indian television channels delivered a rude reminder of the arrival of a
‘new India’ when they blared news of defence minister Rajnath Singh
emblazoning a Rafale fighter jet with an ‘om’ and decking it with flowers,
coconut and lemons, purportedly to ward off evil.
Singh’s actions sharply contrast with the country’s older crop of politicians,
many of whom kept their religious beliefs to themselves instead of
advertising them in public. India’s first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru,
was impatient with religious rituals; Vikram Sarabhai cited this attitude in
one of his letters to a friend as an example of the newly independent
India’s aversion to overt acts of religiosity.
Sudhir Kakar narrates an interesting incident in his autobiography, A Book

of Memory (2011). Gujarati textile mill owners insisted on a Hindu priest
performing the opening ritual for the new Ahmedabad Textile Industry’s
Research Association building in Ahmedabad. Kakar quotes Sarabhai
saying, “Panditji tolerated him to start with but when [Nehru] was asked to
rub his shoulder to the door, he exploded! I was so glad.” From this time,
when India was discovering a new future for itself, we appear to have
arrived at one where the country seems to lack such imagination.
Jawaharlal Nehru coined the term ‘scientific temper’; he defines it as an

attitude of logical and rational thinking. An individual is considered to have
scientific temper if she employs the scientific method when making
decisions.
Science and technology as we know them became popular in India in the

mid-20th century, precipitating socio-economic changes in turn.
Researchers and philosophers had anticipated these changes during the
independence struggle. Nehru had said:
India must break with much of her past and not allow it to dominate the
present. Our lives are encumbered with the dead wood of this past, all that
is dead and has served its purpose has to go. But it does not mean a break
with, or a forgetting of, the vital and life-giving in that past. We can never
forget the ideals that have moved our race, the dreams of the Indian
people through the ages., the wisdom of the ancients, the buoyant energy
and love of life and nature of our forefathers, their spirit of curiosity and
mental adventure. … There is in fact essential incompatibility of all
dogmas with science. Scientific temper cannot be nurtured by ignoring the
fact that there are major differences between the scientific attitude and
the theological and metaphysical attitude; especially in respect of dogma.
Eminent scientists like C.V. Raman, Satyendra Nath Bose, Meghnad

Saha and others were also at the frontline of this social revolution. In those
days, the Indian Science Congress was an excellent platform for dialogues
between the political and the scientific classes, both of which believed that
science and its application could effect economic advancement as well as
in the national social outlook.
The science policy resolution that Parliament passed in 1958 reflected

these sentiments. In 1976, the Government of India reemphasised its
commitment to cultivate scientific temper through a constitutional
amendment (Article 51A), and setup a nodal agency called the National
Council of Science and Technology Communication (NCSTC). But despite
these efforts, scientific temper did not permeate through society and
didn’t much alter the national psyche.
There is a deep relationship between scientific temper and the idea of

secularism, another celebrated facet of our Constitution. The practice of
secularism derives strength and support from the ideas of science while
the science can best motivate change in a society that appreciates
secularism. So the role of scientific temper cannot be overemphasised in a
tradition-bound country like India, where dogma and superstations rule the
roost.
Today, religious extremists question the relevance of science as a force

that guides our spirit and culture. In the late 1990s, Murli Manohar Joshi,
the then minister of human resources, sought to have astrology taught in
universities as a branch of science. More recently, since 2014, the
government has supported the idea that ancient Hindus achieved many
feats that Western scientists are achieving only today, especially in
physics and medicine.
Even today, there are people discussing scientific theories purportedly

secreted in the Bhagavad Gita and how they outstrip general relativity and
quantum mechanics in their ability to faithfully describe nature. Political
leaders dispute the theory of evolution and declare cow urine can cure
cancer. Even others have advanced a majoritarian lie that the Vedic
civilisation originated in India.
Many of the world’s cultures were born when humans had little exact
knowledge of the natural world and looked to religious doctrine for
answers. The advent of modern science knocked back against this
tendency. The progress of science is punctuated by conflicts with religious
beliefs. Galileo Galilei’s support for heliocentrism was controversial during
his lifetime as well as for him personally. In 1615, the Roman Inquisition
concluded heliocentrism “explicitly contradicts in many places the sense
of Holy Scripture.” After Galileo reasserted his views, the inquisition forced
him to recant and spend the rest of his life in house arrest.
Religion and scientific consciousness are two parallel streams. They don’t
converge. As religious beliefs can’t be tested or challenged through
experiments, it is difficult to explore the religious texts that motivate these
beliefs using the methods of reason.
We recognise that there are no clear answers to all the questions raised in
public conversations, so opinions expressed in public shouldn’t be based in
religious ideas; instead they should be reasonable and welcome
reasonable challenges. Blind faith has affected the course of science in
India as well. The forces trying to take India back to the Middle Ages are
undoing the idea of India that its people formulated after years of struggle
and sacrifice.
The shrinking space for scientific temper in India today is worrisome for
the same reasons, and doesn’t augur well for our development. It is not
difficult to see that countries dominated by theocratic ideals struggle to
make scientific and technological leaps. Iran, for example, was one of the
major contributors to the Islamic Golden Age but today, a thick blanket of
Islamic fundamentalism throttles its creativity. Closer home, Pakistan
provides a similarly fitting example.
India’s failure to execute Nehru’s idea of scientific temper in its entirety

could be one major reason for the growth and spread of superstitious
beliefs and fundamentalism today.
When they met in May 1936, C.V. Raman told Gandhi, “Mahatmaji,
religions cannot unite. Science offers the best opportunity for a complete
fellowship. All men of science are brothers.” Gandhi joked, “What about
the converse – all who are not men of science are not brothers?” Raman
replied, “But all can become men of science.”
Let’s hope that someday all cultures free themselves from the shackles of
blind faith – with science likely to play a major hand in this endeavour.
Unto a similar goal, we should celebrate India’s constitutional provision for
the scientific temper and vigorously safeguard it.

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DR.

RAM MANOHAR LOHIYA NATIONAL LAW UNIVERSITY

Project on: - The Shrinking Space for Scientific

SUBMITTED TO: - SUBMITTED BY:

Sociology 3rd Semester

R.M.L.N.L.U B.A.LL.B (Hons.)

without which this assignment would not have been possible.

Sudhir Kakar narrates an interesting incident in his autobiography, A Book

Jawaharlal Nehru coined the term ‘scientific temper’; he defines it as an

Science and technology as we know them became popular in India in the

Eminent scientists like C.V. Raman, Satyendra Nath Bose, Meghnad

The science policy resolution that Parliament passed in 1958 reflected

There is a deep relationship between scientific temper and the idea of

Today, religious extremists question the relevance of science as a force

Even today, there are people discussing scientific theories purportedly

India’s failure to execute Nehru’s idea of scientific temper in its entirety

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