MBBS students in MP to study about RSS & Jana Sangh founders

MBBS students in Madhya Pradesh will henceforth learn about ethics by studying the lives and thinking of RSS and Jana Sangh founders as part of their first-year foundation course.

This was conveyed by the state education minister Vishwas Sarang on Sunday (September 5) to the media. In a move to instill “values, principles, social and medical ethics” in  students, Sarang told the media that first year MBBS students will study about RSS founder Dr Keshav Hedgewar, Jan Sangh founder Pandit Deendayal Upadhyay, Swami Vivekananda and Dr B R Ambedkar in the foundation course in the first year of their MBBS programme.

Hedgewar, Upadhyaya, Swami Vivekanand are part of the Hindutva pantheon of the Sangh, believed to be the ideological mentor of the ruling Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP).

“The students of the first-year course of MBBS (Bachelor of Medicine, Bachelor of Surgery) will be lectured about Hedgewarji, Upadhyayji, Swami Vivekanandji, Ambedkarji and other great personalities. Lessons on these great personalities will inculcate values, principles, social and medical ethics in the students,” said Sarang.

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The first year MBBS students will also learn about Maharshi Charaka, one of the principal contributors to the Ayurveda, and sage Sushrut, known as the father of surgery in India.

The National Medical Council (NMC) had wanted ethical values to be part of the foundation course in the first year (of MBBS), the state government decided to incorporate the study of these great personalities for building the character of students, added Sarang. he next academic session for MBBS students is likely to start by this year-end.

It is the duty of the states to finalise the content of the foundation course, while the NMC decided the syllabus of the MBBS course. On being asked why Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru and Mahatma Gandhi were not included in this course, the minister said that only Nehru had been taught since independence.

“Congress will say that we are saffronising education, so let me say that Hindutva is not just a religion but a way of life,” he said, reported India Today. He added that if anyone thought that teaching culture is “saffronisation, then believe it is saffronisation”.

“If imbibing the values of great men in our youth is saffronisation, then it is absolutely saffronisation,” he said, added media reports.

Hindutva pantheon of the Sangh-Hedgewar, Upadhyaya, Swami Vivekanand

Keshav Baliram Hedgewar, a surgeon, known by his moniker “doctorji” founded the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh in Nagpur in 1925, based on the ideology of Hindutva, with the intention of creating a Hindu Rashtra. Deendayal Upadhyaya was one of the prominent leaders of the Bhartiya Jana Sangh, the forerunner of the BJP.

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“RSS first chief Hedgewarji, Upadhyayaji, Vivekanandji and BR Ambedkarji were great visionaries and human beings. Their lives were based on values. Their thoughts, conduct, and the very personalities are inspiring, the minister said. He said Hedgewar had actively participated in India’s freedom struggle.

“Deendayaljis thought of Antyodaya for helping the last man (the poorest of the poor) was exemplary. Swami Vivekanandji travelled far off lands to showcase the Indian vision. B R Ambedkar was born in a poor family but he went on to frame our Constitution. We have decided to teach (MBBS) students about the inspiring lives of these great personalities from the coming academic session (2021),” Sarang added.

The lectures on Hedgewar, Upadhyaya and others are likely to be clubbed in the topic of medical ethics in the month long foundation course. About 2,000 students take admission in the MBBS course every year in Madhya Pradesh.