Arts and social science subjects have the reputation of being read by the less ‘brainy’ among students. The advance of knowledge through multi-disciplinary studies and interdisciplinary collaboration has done little to change this impression, partly because medicine and applied sciences, such as engineering, supposedly offer better career opportunities and guarantee prosperity. The governor of Tamil Nadu, R.N. Ravi, was perhaps merely expressing received wisdom when he said that it was not desirable for the bulk of students to read humanities, which is what is happening in the state. Mr Ravi gave his opinion a slightly broader look than mere job-fitness by mentioning the need for science in a technologically advanced world. It may be asked whether the Tamil Nadu governor was thinking about the pure sciences when he referred to science as the pole opposite to the liberal arts. Unlikely. A career of study in the pure sciences is challenging and austere, with appropriate jobs difficult to land. India’s education system has long been shifting away from pure science and the arts, making learning instrumental rather than a pursuit of advances in knowledge. The devaluing of the humanities has tragically narrowed the Indian mind and the reduction of pure science studies has produced a large population skilled in application.

Mr Ravi, however, pointed to a poor teaching environment for the thinning of science students and emphasised the importance of proper training for teachers. All of which may be perfectly pertinent, but does this mean that arts and social science subjects have better teachers? Or that the poor teaching environment in those subjects does not matter? Although the shift away from the humanities had started before the Narendra Modi government came to power in Delhi, there had been adequate space for people to follow their preferences. Learning for the sake of knowledge had not been completely devalued. Now, though, the attention to science has also to do with the Mr Modi’s government’s dream of India as world leader, which, politicians feel, can only be achieved with more doctors, engineers and technocrats. Education is now firmly linked to ideological goals; hence Mr Ravi’s concern that achievers abroad are citizens of the world without a specific ‘Indian’ awareness. Making a punch of nationalism and education is to finally destroy all possibilities of the impersonal pursuit of knowledge.