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[Arun Gupta]

When the "establishment" is caught out in a lie about history, it serves to
discredit the establishment.  The Whitewash of history feeds into paranoia
about the "real" intentions of the establishment.  Demolition of the
sanitized history becomes another method of disestablishment.

In my opinion, in the context of India :

1. School textbooks should avoid feeding existing prejudices.  Some amount
of whitewashing there is acceptable.

2. Whitewashing should not extend to anything beyond high school.

3. The real issue that confronts us, e.g., from a Babri Masjid situation is
how do Hindus and Muslims want to deal with each other TODAY.  Making it
into a historical argument (e.g., attempting to prove that Babur was
"secular" or Ayodhya was somewhere else) simply obscures the issue.

4. Honesty will favor the saner side (establishment versus mob) in these
battles.

Best regards,
-Arun Gupta