Ban Religion in Classrooms

                                     BAN RELIGION IN CLASSROOM 
As a kid in Kashmir, I recited 'Kalma' in the morning assembly at the school in our village.As a teenager in Jammu, I recited Gayatri Mantra.I was never able to figure out why I was reciting Kalma in Kashmir and Gayatri Mantra in Jammu. Though now I see the whole situation crystal clear.The Islamists in Kashmir were bent on making me a dutiful Muslim and the exponents of Hinduism in Jammu tried their best to inculcate a 'Hindu way of life' within me.Thankfully I rejected both and transformed into an atheist .But ironically those who are reciting only Kalma or Gayatri Mantra will unfortunately develop into Muslims and Hindus with only one common feeling: hatred for each other.
     It is a strange but a known fact that some[read most] of our teachers preach religion in classrooms. I remember in Kashmir we were taught the benefits of Namaz and in Jammu the magic of offering water to the sun .Such teachers commit a crime by controlling and restricting the thought process of children.Thoughts should not be restricted ,they should be guided.Let them[children] think on all lines and in all possible ways.By limiting their thinking, we will produce  humans bereft of all humane feelings of love, compassion and brotherhood,they will be machines programmed to hate.We will never be able to stop Godhras and Gujrats instead we will fuel them and harm our civilization  and culture in an awful manner.Leave aside working for a developed india, we will be engaged in annihilating each other .We will end up doing no good and some decades later an anthropologist will find our mass grave and name us as 'fossils of hatred'.Hopefully he will be educated enough to teach a lesson to the people of that time :-
                'hate and end up like this.'
    It will be in the fitness of things to limit religion and other personal beliefs as strictly an individual affair and asses religious practices with a scientific and objective yardstick.Infact religion like other social phenomenon and philosophies  should evolve and change with the change in scientific,economic and social transformation.Religion should serve the humanity to move ahead and develop, it should not act as a bottleneck in the social and intellectual progress by being preached in educational institutions.

By-Arif Hayat Nairang
TISS, Mumbai