Renowned historian Romila Thapar has strongly criticised recent moves to drop major historical periods from school curricula, asserting that history must be understood as an unbroken continuum rather than as selective episodes.

Addressing an online audience at the ongoing ninth edition of the Kerala Literature Festival (KLF) on Saturday, she described the removal of entire dynasties, including the Mughals, from textbooks as illogical and damaging to historical understanding.

During the session titled “Women Writing History: Three Generations”, Thapar spoke on a wide range of issues, from the growing popularity of history-related content on social media to the significance of feminist perspectives and the role of education in fostering critical inquiry, news agency PTI reported.

"The kinds of things that are happening, where, for example, chunks of history are being thrown out of the syllabus or we are told we don't need to study them, are nonsense. History is a continuous process. It is an evolution of people and cultures, of ways of behaviour and ways of thinking," she said.

"That continuity cannot be broken by saying, 'All right, we throw this dynasty out, we throw Mughals out, we throw out that'. It breaks history up and makes no sense," said the eminent scholar, who has authored more than 25 academic books.

Her remarks come amid reports that the National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT) has revised the Class 7 Social Science textbook for the 2025–26 academic year, removing chapters on the Delhi Sultanate and the Mughals.

The revised syllabus is said to place greater emphasis on ancient Indian dynasties such as the Mauryas, Shungas and Satavahanas, as well as cultural traditions and sacred sites across religious traditions.

Thapar, 93, also expressed unease over the increasing influence of what she termed “popular history” on social media platforms, warning that it often obscures the distinction between researched scholarship and personal opinion. She urged readers and viewers to depend on trained historians for reliable interpretations of the past.

"There is a difference now between the two -- popular history and what professional historians write -- and it is important to note that difference and understand what it entails. When quoting a historical statement, one should be aware whether it comes from professional historical writing or a statement propagated on social media," she explained.

Looking back on her own academic career, Thapar noted that while she may not always have consciously framed her work from a woman’s perspective, she made a sustained effort to integrate feminist insights.

She stressed that beyond writing feminist history, it was crucial for women to practise feminism in everyday professional life by asserting independence and critical thought, reported PTI.

"An autonomous woman, I think, is absolutely essential. Therefore, my attitude to this has been, yes, we have to write feminist history, that is a given, but if I am not writing feminist history, I am at least behaving like a feminist. I am propagating that an autonomous woman is an absolutely essential component of any society," she concluded.

The four-day Kerala Literature Festival is featuring more than 400 speakers from across the world, including Nobel laureates Abdulrazak Gurnah and Abhijit Banerjee, astronaut Sunita Williams, author Kiran Desai, essayist Pico Iyer, Jnanpith awardee Pratibha Ray, sports figures Rohan Bopanna and Ben Johnson, and Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales. KLF 2026, now in its ninth edition, will conclude on Sunday.