The Congress-led Karnataka government has planned to revamp the school textbooks, triggering a political slugfest between the ruling party and the BJP-led opposition. The Karnataka government is set to remove a chapter on RSS founder Dr Keshav Baliram Hedgewar.
It was reported that a chapter on Dr Hedgewar, which was introduced in the state syllabus by the previous BJP government, will be removed from the Class 10 Kannada textbook. Chief Minister Siddaramaiah and School Education Minister Madhu Bangarappa reportedly took the decision at a meeting for educational reforms in Bengaluru.
The BJP has criticised the Karnataka government’s move to revamp the curriculum with the intent to remove Sangh’s contribution. In an interview with ANI, BJP’s National General Secretary CT Ravi said, “They (Congress) can change syllabus, they’re in power but they can’t change the history. Everyone knows about Sangh Parivaar’s patriotism…everywhere Sangh Parivaar’s ideology is getting stronger, that can’t be changed…our ideology is patriotism and does Congress want to eliminate patriotism and want to make this ‘Mughalistaan’?”
Congress had promised to undo the changes introduced in the school textbooks by the previous BJP government in its election manifesto. It was reported that lessons authored by Chakravarti Sulibele and Bannanje Govindacharya could also be axed from the curriculum.
A group of intellectuals, including K Marulasiddappa, SG Siddaramaiah and Vasundhara Bhoopati, had met with Siddaramaiah after he became CM and urged him to withdraw textbooks which were revised by the previous BJP government.
Earlier, Congress MLC BK Hariprasad said that the Karnataka government would not include the life stories of individuals such as Dr Hedgewar in the school curriculum while calling the RSS founder a “coward” and a “fake freedom fighter.” He further said that the ideology of the Sangh Parivar would not be allowed to influence the functioning of any government department.
In a meeting with Siddaramaiah, the Programme Head of Universalisation of Education at the National Law School of India University (NLSIU) Bengaluru, Professor VP Niranjan, proposed that the altered chapters in the school textbooks, which have been published, could be excluded from teaching and evaluation. Thereafter, it was reported that as the textbooks for the 2023-24 academic year have been published, the same will not be republished; however, the teachers have been ordered to exclude the lessons from the curriculum.
Karnataka Deputy CM DK Shivakumar had said that the government would not implement the National Education Policy and would rather have its own state education policy. He further said that under the state education policy, the changes made under the previous BJP government would not be implemented.
Karnataka Minister Dinesh Gundu said, “There should be stories about the people who fought for country’s freedom not the people of your choice or whom you (BJP) idolise. We should have stories about people who have really contributed to the building of the nation,” in an interview with ANI. He added, “If you talk about the freedom struggle, those who participated in the freedom struggle -history should reflect that, not your personal choices, not who you idolise. BJP has tried to infuse their ideological issues into textbooks, which is not correct. So, Congress party will have to look at it very seriously and take corrective measures.”
He further said, “A lot of government properties have been handed over to many institutions belonging to the Sangh Parivar. So, we have to look at all those things, see if they have been done properly, legally and what we can do on those issues. But definitely, a lot of State Govt properties have been given to institutions & organisations which are closely connected to the RSS and BJP.”
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