The distortion of history, which constitutes the denial of historical crimes, is called negationism. In attempting to revise the past, illegitimate historical revisionism uses techniques inadmissible in proper historical discourse, such as presenting known forged documents as genuine; inventing ingenious, but implausible, reasons for distrusting genuine documents; attributing his or her own conclusions to books and sources reporting the opposite; manipulating statistical series to shape the perspective; and deliberately mis-translating writings.

According to many scholars, the study of history has always been of controversial nature. Truth about events, occasions and happenings of the past get so twisted, that it turns out to be difficult to approve the realities set forth by various trusted sources. But the fact is that it’s not only the study of history but also the teaching of history that is in crisis. National educational modules have been intended to ingrain in students a wide range of key concepts like chronological comprehension, social, ethnic and religious diversity, change and congruity, cause and outcome, importance and interpretation, whereas they are lagging far behind in requisite critical thinking.

Many consider it hard to put the historical episodes they studied within any coherent, long-term narrative. They are only aware of particular occasions, events, characters and periods; however do not have an overview. Their chronological comprehension is often immature thus they find it difficult to link developments together. The trouble is not only with the theory but with the practice too that has evolved in too many educational institutes. History is emphatically not being made available "to all" in educational institutes. Too few students, especially in the public sector, spend too little time doing it. And what they study lacks all cohesion.

The use of the rhetoric of religious nationalism has been intensified in the history writing in Pakistan. For instance, the ideology of Pakistan occupies a central position in all history text-books and is defined as follows:

“. . . that guiding principle which has been accepted by the Muslims of the majority regions of the South Asian subcontinent and which allows them to lead their lives individually and collectively, according to the principles of Islam.” (M D Zafar, Pakistan Studies for Medical Students)

Shireen Mazari’s book on the issue of Kargil is a classical example of distortion of history, in which she asserts that the Kargil operation was planned only to counter moves expected by the Indians in this area, whereas it has been historically proved that this plan was of Pakistan to send in a mixture of Kashmiri fighters and regular/paramilitary troops to gain Kashmir. The study of history is no longer concerned with the exploration of knowledge, but rewriting for imprinting the ideologies of ruling regimes, the notion of Islamic fundamentalism in the case of Pakistan, which has played a critically important role in transforming history into an instrumentalist discipline.

It is worth mentioning here that such historical writings are the products of colonial modernization, since religious nationalist identities created by the colonial masters have been used to foster essentialised religio-ethnic identities before and after the colonial rule. A crucial role has been played by modern globalized structure of politics in sustaining and disseminating such religious nationalism, so it can also be argued that the rising strength of religious nationalism in Pakistan has been contemporaneous with the blatant subjection of the state to the force of globalisation. This may propose that the academic historians are gotten in a trap. They are generally loyal individuals of a national community, which is built around a manufactured national identity.

Since history is a basic part of the image, the academic historians - when they are composing the historical backdrop of their own nation - may feel a commitment not to harm or subvert the national image. This thus could place imperatives in their academic freedom's way to seek after the proof wherever it leads. Our educational establishment is still in profound refusal about the harm its beloved 'new history' has done.