Delhi’s govt schools not hiring Urdu teachers, Muslim students forced to study Sanskrit

Times of India: New Delhi: Tuesday, 02 September 2014.

Over 14,800 Muslim students across 100 Delhi government schools are being forced to study Sanskrit as there is no recruitment of Urdu teachers.

Some schools, like the Sarvodaya Kanya Vidyalaya, Sultanpuri Block H, have as many as 789 Muslim students; yet there are no Urdu teachers appointed.

According to NGO Nawa-E-Haque.Despite, despite directions from Directorate of Education (DoE), a majority of schools don't have Urdu teachers, thereby violating the Delhi School Education Act, 1973 and other constitutional laws, which grant the option of opting for one's mother tongue as third language from class VI to X.

On May 21, 2012, the welfare branch of DoE issued a circular directing heads of the schools to record the student's language preference at the time of admission; and also directed the Post Fixation Cell (PFC) to intimate the DoE about requirement of teachers in the opted language.

Again, on July 15, 2013, the assistant director of education (PFC) wrote to all deputy directors of education in every district for creation of posts for Urdu teachers in Delhi's government schools. The deputy directors were asked to give the exact number of Urdu teachers required, based on current student enrolment, by July 24, 2013.

Asad Ghazi, president of Nawa-E-Haque said that, based on an RTI with regard to a 100 schools, despite official orders, "A majority of Delhi government schools do not have provisions for teaching Urdu due to which Muslim students are left with no option except studying Sanskrit."

According to Ghazi, a representation and the first list of 100 schools have been forwarded to the DoE, National Commission for Minority Educational Institutions, National Commissioner of Linguistics Minorities, Central Board of Secondary Education and Urdu Academy. He said that they are also working on a second list, where the situation looks no different.

Of the 100 schools cited by the NGO, 50 of them have 100 or more Muslim students and 16 of them have 250 or more such students who are made to study Sanskrit. Despite many attempts, the director of DoE could not be contacted.