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COVER STORY: ASTROLOGY
STAR WARS
Introduction of astrology courses in universities
has drawn Murli Mahohar Joshi and the UGC into a legal and political maze
By Sumit Mitra
The
BJP stormed into political prominence flaunting its distinctive commitment
to cultural nationalism, a euphemism for Hindutva. However, the imperatives
of coalition politics led to these contentious beliefs being put on the
back burner. Not for Union Human Resources Development Minister Murli
Manohar Joshi. Far from shying away from combat, the pugnacious ideologue
has used his stint in office to bulldoze causes calculated to endear him
to a core constituency of the very committed. He took on the entrenched
left establishment in a crusade to purge the Indian Council of Historical
Research and riled extreme secularists by his decision to begin a conference
of education ministers with an invocation to Goddess Saraswati.
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ON THE ASCENDANT: K.N. Rao lectures on astrology
at the Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan
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These acts of ideological grandstanding have
turned out to be exercises in shadow boxing compared to the controversy
triggered by the decision of the University Grants Commission (UGC)-an
autonomous body under the supervision of his ministry-to approve graduate
and post-graduate courses in Vedic astrology under the grand description
Jyotirvigyan.
The debate over whether astrology is a science
or a pseudo-science is hoary. Some scientists and self-professed rationalists
have periodically got into a tizzy over the plethora of astrology columns
appearing in the media. To them the undeniable popularity of astrology
was evidence of the stranglehold of superstition on the society and a
complete negation of what the Constitution deified as the "scientific
temper". However, resistance to the UGC decision has acquired a larger
dimension because it has a bearing on state policy-as opposed to the private
faith of individuals.
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JOSHI EFFECT
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 #
Vedic astrology is offered as a university course funded by the
UGC to inquire into "events happening in human life and in
universe on a time scale".
# Strapped for cash, 45 universities put in a
bid to offer degree courses in astrology. The UGC approves the claims
of 20.
# Courses are formulated for BA and MA degrees
in Hindu priesthood.
# A new university course in Human Consciousness
and Yogic Sciences includes parapsychology and the "seven levels
of consciousness" in its syllabus.
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As Joshi said in Parliament, even before the
UGC decided to introduce Jyotirvigyan, astrology was being taught "as
a part of Sanskrit or some other branch" in 16 universities in India.
In reputed centres of learning, like Banaras Hindu University (BHU), astrology
is taught as an extra-mural course funded internally, with its graduates
qualifying for the title of "shastri", comparable to a BA though
not its equivalent in the academic pecking order. The Lal Bahadur Shastri
Sanskrit Vidyapeeth in Delhi runs an astrology department as a part of
its Sanskrit faculty. The UGC plan, therefore, was greeted by the intellectual
outcasts as a welcome leveller. Those on the fringes of academia would
now be conferred full membership-and public funding. No wonder Ram Chandra
Pandey, head of BHU's astrology department, fulminated against the critics
of the decision as "either illiterate or those who do not want to
accept historical facts".
The UGC's Vedic astrology course follows the
same principles underlying the existing syllabi, which are based on the
concept of a fixed zodiac with the earth at its centre. K.N. Rao, who
heads Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan's astrology faculty and helped formulate
the UGC syllabus, says that the official course will not challenge the
Ptolemaic concept of the universe (the fact of the earth's regular tilting
on its axis was recognised by Indian astronomy in the 5th century but
it was not allowed to upset astrological calculations) but will surely
make it more up-to-date with a parallel study of astronomy and cosmology.
These modern garnishings on a geocentric view
of the universe dredged up from oblivion, and the cranky yet popular faith
in the faraway planets controlling human destiny, obviously enraged the
scientific community. Eminent astrophysicist J.V. Narlikar called the
decision "a great leap backwards". Former UGC chairman Yash
Pal spoke at a conference of non-NDA chief ministers organised in Delhi
by Sahmat, an outfit with CPI(M) links, against the "saffronisation"
of education.
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