Class 4 Textbook Encourages Breathing “Experiment” to Kill Kittens

The textbook asks children to torture kittens to prove that living beings need to breathe or they will die.

The experiment is to prove that living beings need to breathe or they will die. (Photo: @Priya_Menon)

Of late, several textbooks in Indian schools have come under fire for publishing questionable content in the name of education.

Last week, a sociology textbook for class 12 made headlines as it said “parents of ugly girls need to pay dowry.” This week, a class 4 book on environmental studies, while telling students about the importance of breathing, describes an experiment which asks students to practically suffocate a kitten to death.

The book which is part of the curriculum for a Delhi school states “living things needs air to breathe and no living thing can live without air for a few minutes”.

It goes on to say “You can do an experiment” and asks children to put a small kittens in two wooden boxes each and cover with lids, one with holes and one without. Then the book obviously concludes that the cat in the box without the holes has died.

All this trouble to explain to children that living beings cannot survive without breathing. And its ironic how a book on environmental conservation is asking children to get proof of breathing by killing an innocent cat.

This obviously left people on social media enraged.

Jokes about Schrodinger’s Cat were also made.

However, people did manage to get in touch with Maneka Gandhi to remove this from the curriculum.

Also Read: Ugly Girls Have to Pay More Dowry: Maharashtra Sociology Textbook