The Jammu & Kashmir government has ordered a comprehensive academic and content audit of academic material in colleges, universities, and public libraries across the Union Territory. This move comes after a similar order was issued for schools. The audit will cover not just books but also journals, research publications, academic theses and dissertations, and digital repositories of academic institutions.
The government has stated that no publication or academic material containing factually inaccurate, misleading, distorted, inflammatory, unlawful or otherwise objectionable content shall be procured, prescribed, recommended, retained, circulated, published, hosted or otherwise made available in educational institutions. The initiative aims to reinforce academic standards, strengthen institutional accountability, preserve the integrity of the educational ecosystem, and establish a transparent, objective, and uniform framework for the periodic academic and content review of educational resources. However, principals of educational institutions have expressed concerns over the lack of specific guidelines for implementation.
A principal of a government higher secondary school claimed that he had been verbally told that any book or material on the pattern of the 25 books banned by the government last year constitutes objectionable material. Academics have also expressed concerns that the order could have a direct impact on the quality of scholarship, research, and independent thinking, especially in higher education. Research is about engaging with multiple viewpoints and arriving at informed conclusions.
This order will deal a blow to genuine research and scholarship in Jammu and Kashmir. Every competing perspective deepens our understanding of a subject. There have long been unwritten restrictions on certain areas of research at the Kashmir University.
The J&K government had previously banned the sale and publication of 25 books on Kashmir in Jammu and Kashmir for propagating false narrative and secessionism. The banned books included A G Noorani’s ‘The Kashmir Dispute’, ‘Contested Lands’ by Sumantra Bose, Arundhati Roy’s ‘Azadi,’ and ‘In Search of Future (The Kashmir Story)’ by David Devdas.
