Hindustan Times: Jaipur: Wednesday,
May 25, 2016.
A team of
educationalists has termed the new Rajasthan board textbooks as “shallow,” cast
in the “Hindutwa framework” and decided to move the high court against them.
The team
comprised educationists, like Hindi professor Apoorvanand of Delhi University.
former NCERT committee member Rajeev Gupta, RTI activist and educationist
Nikhil Dey, Komal Shrivastava of Bharat Gyan Vigyan Samiti and others.
The review
was necessitated following a political storm over removal of chapters on
Jawaharlal Nehru and the Right to Information (RTI) from the new textbooks. The
review panel began its review last week and each subject expert got two days’
time to vet the textbooks from Class 1 to Class 9 and a few books from Class 11
and 12.
The team
released a brief report to the media on Sunday.
Apoorvanand
observed, “Nowhere in the world, textbooks are brought out in a span of 45
days.”
The books
have been edited in the framework of Hindutva ideology, he said and cited a
Class 9 Social Studies book as an example where a chapter on Sindhu Ghati
Culture (Indus Valley Civilization) has been renamed Sindhu Saraswati Culture
which resonates with the RSS’ recreation of history. The change appears to be
an attempt to show that Indus Valley civilization was part of the Vedic
culture, without any evidence.
“This mixture
of history and mythology is likely to confuse the students.”
He also
referred to a Class 9 book which shows Aryans as the native of India and
defines Arya as a word meaning higher qualities. In the section on World Wars I
and II, the role of Hitler and Fascism has been omitted. In Class 11, a chapter
glorifying Hitler has been added.
Rajeev Gupta,
retired professor from Rajasthan University, said Class 7 textbooks mention
that strikes are wrong and improper which suggests the National Trade Union Act
is wrong. “In the new books, displacement of only Sindhi community during
India’s partition has been mentioned. The new edition does not adequately
represent marginalised communities, like Dalits and tribals,” Gupta stated.
Nikhil Dey
and Shanker Singh termed the removal of a chapter on the RTI from Class 8
textbook as an attempt to erase the acknowledgement of the RTI and the role of
the common man in getting through the act.
Komal
Shrivastava said, “In the science book of Class 8, the chapter on bio-
diversity begins with a shloka from the Vishnu Puran, which is not even
connected with the subject. Towards the end of the chapter too there are
Sanskrit shlokas. This is not required in science books.” Shrivastava also
expressed surprise as to why the chapter on animal reproduction was removed
from Class 8 textbook but that of plants retained.
Ravi Kant, a
maths expert, observed that the new books focused on Vedic maths, failed to
encourage mathematical and analytical skills, which has been laid down as one
of the objectives of the National Curriculum Framework (NCF 2005).
However,
school education minister Vasudev Devnani said the textbook had been changed to
instill the feeling of nationalism among students.
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