Statescan
Massive demonstration by Shiksha Bachao Andolan Samiti
FOC
Hundreds of activists of Shiksha Bachao Andolan Samiti (SBAS), under the banner of ?Save Education?, organised a demonstration before the office of Central Advisory Board of Education (CABE) in New Delhi on June 7. The demonstrators strongly opposed the move on part of Union HRD Minister, Arjun Singh and his communist supporters to push a retrograde, unscientific and irrelevant educational school education system. The Shiksha Bachao Andolan Samiti is a forum of 14 organisations committed to nationalist education.
The Samiti said that the move to hastily pass a draft National Curriculum Framework for School Education (NCFSE) at the CABE meeting proved that it was definitely a communist design to weaken the national spirit by introducing ill-conceived, irrelevant and downright divisive contents in the national education system. ?The move to kill value education based on religion is most shocking. Sanskrit, which is India'sgreatest contribution to the world, is sought to be given a diminutive status,? said Shri Dinanath Batra, convenor of the Samiti while talking to Organiser.
Shri Batra said that vocational education and the minimum levels of education were being downgraded in the draft Curriculum Framwork for School Education, which was being introduced in CABE. ?The academic contents in the teaching of sciences, social sciences and languages is being sought to be reduced. This will prove counter-productive in our quest to be a world power in the 21st century,? he added.
He further said that the Shiksha Bachao Andolan Samiti was shocked at the draconian manner in which this draft was developed and pushed without wide national consultation. ?Only Leftists NGOs and individuals were consulted. What is most reprehensible is that the syllabi for each academic discipline was developed even before the NCFSE was approved. The SBAS appeals to all the state governments to reject this bogus draft and prevent its implementation in their states. The HRD Minister, Shri Arjun Singh, must be given a befitting reply for the sleight of hand displayed towards the secular and federal spirit of our Constitution,? Shri Batra said in a statement issued in New Delhi.
The Samiti also wanted the government to withdraw all the frivolous and baseless charges leveled against Prof. J. S. Rajput. Describing the government'sharassment of Prof. Rajput as an unprecedented act of Stalinist vendetta, the Samiti urged all right-thinking Indians to demand that this sham inquiry against him be dropped and that he be allowed to receive the highest award in the field of education, the Jan Comenious Medal, which was awarded to him by UNESCO in July 2004. The Samiti also condemned the reintroduction of old NCERT books denigrating the Hindus, Sikhs, Jains, Jats, etc. (FOC)
