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Recently, the Kerala State Commission for Protection of Child Rights (KSCPCR) took suo motu cognisance of an event in several schools affiliated with the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) across the state. As part of the so-called “guru pada pooja” — a ritual promoted under the guise of cultural respect — students were made to wash the feet of retired teachers in public.
These events, held in schools affiliated with the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS)-backed Vidya Bharati network, have triggered public outrage and a renewed debate over what values are being imparted in India’s classrooms.
This is not an isolated event. It is part of a larger ideological project that seeks to redefine the purpose of education in India — from nurturing scientific temper, free-thinking, and democratic values to conditioning young minds into hierarchies of obedience and servitude. And when such acts are legitimised in schools, the foundational values of a democratic republic come under strain.
The Sangh's cultural expansion in Kerala
This act occurred in Kerala and is not incidental. Contrary to its popular image as a progressive, left-leaning state, Kerala today has the second highest number of RSS shakhas in the country — more than 5,000 — just below Uttar Pradesh, even surpassing Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, and Gujarat, all much larger and ruled by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
With a population of around 3.61 crore, the per capita presence of RSS shakhas in Kerala reflects not just organisational muscle, but a deep and sustained cultural intervention.
This ideological influence has not remained confined to shakhas or street corners. It has now entered classrooms and even rituals of schooling. Increasingly, the attempt is not just to educate children, but to socialise them into a dominant-caste, brahmanical, patriarchal, centuries-old social order.
This context should also be noted in accordance with comments made by BJP’s Member of Parliament (MP) Suresh Gopi, now a Union Minister, who publicly stated that he wished to be reborn as a Brahmin, describing those who wear the sacred thread as “Gods.” These comments are not cultural observations; they reflect a worldview in which caste is not just a lived reality but a social hierarchy.
When such ideas are voiced by union ministers and echoed in classroom rituals, we must ask: what kind of citizenship are we cultivating?
Culture or control?
Indian culture places deep value on reverence for teachers. Honouring teachers is a noble act. But respect must never mean ritualised submission. Respect should not be reserved for teachers, it must extend to all fellow human beings.
Like many Indians, I was taught to respect my teachers. And I do. But that respect was built in classrooms where I was encouraged to ask questions, challenge ideas, and think critically — not through rituals, but through dialogue. That is the education I value, and that is what we are at risk of losing.
Respect doesn’t need rituals, just as love doesn’t require grand gestures. It needs honesty and space.
The invocation of tradition here is not neutral. It is a political project that privileges certain communities, values obedience over questioning, and replaces secularism with a mythologised version of “Bharatiya culture.” In such a framework, a teacher is no longer a guide but a master; a student, not a learner but a devotee.
In power-laden environments such as schools, the idea of “voluntary” participation is often illusory. Children cannot meaningfully consent when authority is involved. When respect is choreographed into acts of physical submission, especially in institutions meant to promote inquiry, critical thinking, and equality, the meaning of that respect changes. It is no longer about admiration; it becomes about control. This act reflects “slavery.”
The constitutional violations we cannot ignore
Crucially, these rituals violate the letter and spirit of the Indian Constitution. The Right to Education (RTE) under Article 21A, reinforced by the RTE Act, 2009, guarantees more than access to schooling. It guarantees the child’s dignity, safety, and right to a learning environment free of coercion or discrimination. Section 17 of the Act expressly prohibits both physical punishment and mental harassment. Rituals that involve children kneeling, washing feet, and performing acts of symbolic surrender are both.
They also conflict with Articles 14 and 15, which ensure equality before the law and prohibit discrimination based on religion, caste, or place of birth. Feet-washing may seem innocuous, but it draws from a deeply brahmanical code of social hierarchy. It invisibly reinforces caste privilege by embedding rituals that elevate one tradition above all others.
Moreover, Article 28, which guarantees freedom from religious instruction in state-funded or state-recognised schools, is undermined when overtly Hindu rituals are normalised in classrooms. Even if these schools are privately run, they are affiliated with CBSE, regulated by state guidelines, and subject to the secular principles enshrined in our constitutional order.
Judicial precedent further strengthens this argument. In Bijoe Emmanuel v. State of Kerala (1986), the Supreme Court protected a student’s right not to participate in activities that violate their conscience. Even passive presence in religious or caste-based rituals could, under this precedent, constitute a breach of fundamental rights.
Similarly, in MC Mehta v. State of Tamil Nadu (1996), the Court reaffirmed that a child’s dignity and holistic development are essential components of their right to life under Article 21.
Schools are not temples, teachers are not deities
There is nothing wrong with honouring teachers. But respect must never be equated with ritualised subordination. No child should be made — or even subtly pressured — to kneel, touch feet, or perform religious acts under the gaze of school authorities.
This is not cultural education. It is indoctrination, aimed at grooming children into accepting hierarchy and authority without question. The classroom, which should be a space for liberation, becomes one of obedience and control.
Modern Indian education, as envisioned in the Constitution and reaffirmed in the National Education Policy 2020, must promote scientific temper, critical thinking, democratic citizenship, and inclusivity. None of these values is served by rituals that demand unquestioning obedience or symbolic reverence.
When students are taught from a young age to bow rather than question, to accept tradition without reflection, we do not create democratic citizens — we create passive subjects.
The RSS and its affiliates are attempting to reshape education itself, to transform public schools into private temples of ideology.
The response must be equally political and public. Teachers’ unions must speak out against this pedagogical feudalism. Progressive educators and parents must insist that no ritual with caste or religious connotations finds a place in school ceremonies. Child rights bodies must stop issuing routine notices and instead develop clear ethical protocols that reaffirm constitutional values in educational spaces.
The republic cannot be built on its knees
In a metamodern age — one that oscillates between irony and sincerity, tradition and progress — acts like guru pada pooja do more than just provoke discomfort. They challenge us to ask: are we educating children for a pluralist future, or conditioning them into an imagined past?
The RSS’ vision of guru-shishya parampara (the teacher-student tradition) is not about knowledge — it is about control. If we do not contest it now, we risk raising generations of citizens who accept power but never question it. Democratic ideals, humanity, and critical thinking will all be eroded.
To many participants, it may feel like a harmless homage. But when tradition is enforced in institutional spaces without questioning, it becomes indoctrination, not culture.
Let us teach our children to stand tall, not kneel.
Let them ask questions, not absorb dogma.
Let our schools be temples of learning, not laboratories of cultural indoctrination.
The fight for democratic, child-centred education is not just about what happens inside the classroom. It is about the future of the Indian republic itself. The idea of the republic cannot be reduced to religious notions of dharma or any singular cultural principle.
We must reject the symbolic violence of rituals like guru pada pooja, and instead reaffirm a pedagogy rooted in equality, dignity, plurality, and freedom.
Abhijay A is a political analyst and columnist. Views expressed are the author’s own.