Present situation in Uttar Pradesh

The scheme named 'Kulp' is compulsory for all primary schools in the state. Through it, schools have been directed, especially in rural areas, to involve RSS pracharaks in naitik shiksha' (moral education).

There can be little doubt that the intention is to reorient all state run schools in Uttar Pradesh along the lines of the RSS-run Saraswati Shishu and Bal Vidya Mandirs. While announcing the scheme in U.R, the minister said Kulp was being introduced 'to entrance the qualitative standard of education' in schools and to ensure that 'teachers are an intermediary between school, family and society.'

Under the new scheme, schools and their students will necessarily have to celebrate religious fastivals-Raksha Bandhan, Guru Dakshina, Ram Navami, Dussera-and observe the birth and death anniversaries of stalwarts of Hindutva, such as Keshak Baliram Hedgewar the founder of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh and Shyama Prasad Mukherjee.

The singing of Sare Jahan Se Achcha has been abandoned in favour of Vande Mataram and Vah Shakti thamein do e daya nidhan. Govt. schools have also been told to form committee of local voluntary organisations. This is apparently a covert move to facilitiate and legitimise the selective involvement of the RSS and- its activists in the education process.

It all started with education minister Gaur issuing a directive in March this year that all government schools start their day with the singing of Vande Mataram and bowing before the statue of goddess Saraswati. The firman had created an uproar among various sections of religious minorities, Dalits, backwards and progressive elements from the upper castes who saw in it an obvious move towards saffronisation of the education system in the state.

The result of the protests has been that some minority institutions have been 'exempted' from this directive. This exemption raises it own problems as this will lead to further ghetoisation of an already alientated Muslim community towards the much maligned madarasas in the state.

Muslim children being enrolled into the RSS-run Bal Vidya Mandirs and Saraswati Shishu Mandirs. Exaggerated claims are being made about the number of Muslim students who have enrolled in such schools in the recent period. Currently 30,000 students from the families of "Rashtrabhakt" (nationalist) Muslims are studying in Shishu and Bal Vidya Mandir. The claim not withstanding, there is little evidence of mass Muslim participation in RSS-run school.

Children are thus being denied knowledge of the historical fact that Bhagat singh, for example, was neither a champion of Hindutva, as the Sangh Parivar projects him, nor a mere terrorist, as the congress would have it, but a revolutionary, an atheist and a firm believer in cultural pluralism.

Maharashtra :

The medieval history of Maharashtra begins and ends with Shivaji. The text book of the fourth standard has 19 chapters and 75 pages exclusively on Shivaji. All other historic figures exist only in reference to him. So is the case with a large part of the text book for the fourth standard. Infact, through a State Government order the history syllabus in Maharashtra has bypassed the National Education Policy. A member of the History subject committee, Professor Bhaskar L Bholay, Nagpur, says political pressure prevented them from following the national policy.

"In the revised history syllabus for the fourth standard drafted by the State Council of Education Research and Training (SCERT), there were a few chapters on Indian Culture as per the national policy. In order to accommodate these, we had cut a few chapters on Shivaji", said Bholay.

However, before the panel could come out with the revised syllabus, the Shiv Sena mouthpiece, Saamna, and Kesri, a Marathi newspaper from Pune, blew up the news of chapters on Shivaji being cut.

Rajasthan:

Presently RSS is trying their level best to propagate Hindutva through text books. A series of booklets , tilled Sanskriti Gyan, giving the RSS perspective of Indian history culture, have been distibuted in the 6,000 odd Saraswati Shishu Mandira, the Vidya Bharati-run schools.

The BJP-led Govt. in Rajasthan has also effected changes in the text books prescribed by the Rajasthan Board of Secondary Education by incorporating the RSS view point.

When questioned recently about this recently Mr. Joshi maintained he was unaware of the books being tought in Vidya Bharati. As for as Rajasthan is concerned, he said, there were no directions from the Centre and since education is a state subject, state boards were free to frame the school syllabi. The booklets distributed in Vidya Bharati contains the map of India which emcompasses not only Pakistan & Bangladesh but the entire region of Bhutan, Nepal, Tibet and even parts of Myanmar, all forming part of "punnaya bhoomi Bharat."

The books further say the first settlers in Iran were Indians, that the credit of lighting the lamp of culture in China goes to India. Homer’s works were inspired by the Ramayana and the languages of the indegeneous people of the North America (Red Indians) were derived from ancient Indian languages. There are further more issues which includes the Babri Masjid issue like "who was the first Muslim to plunder the Ramjanambhoomi shrine, how many times was it plundered, who built this temple and why is it not a masjid?" The answer is, it is not a masjid since Muslims do not offer namaj there and it has been invaded 77 times.

A committee was formed in the year 1992 to evoluate these books form all states. According to the officials at. NCERT, the nodal agency for this committee, even its major recommandation that only text books authorised by a specially constituted committee in each state be taught in schools, had not been implemented.

BJP’s education policy implanting communalism in YOUNG BRAINS :-

The state education minister’s conference ended in embarrassment for the Human Resource Development Minister as belligerent participants forced major changes in the allegedly "Saffron" agenda and the Prime Minister declared the country’s education system had "no place for bigotry and religious intolerance."

Some of the recent Proposals muted by the Education Minister’s Conference

In the education Ministers’ Conference the HRD Ministry of the BJP led Govt. at the centre muted some proposals which was nothing but an effort to communalise and commercialise the entire education system in the name of Nationalisation. Some of the dangerous proposals :

1. Sanskrit will be a compulsory subject upto the Degree level.
2. Saraswati Vandana will be compulsory player form the school students irrespective of religion, caste creed etc.
3. All the private schools which are running for ten years will be automatically recognised.

The main objective of this proposal is to recognise the RSS run schools and to commercialise the entire schools education system. Through this move the State Governments will be bypassed. (eds)

4. Hindu culture will be inculcated among all the students right from the primary level to the highest level.
5. Private sectors will be encouraged in setting up of educational institutions.

This is nothing but to enthusize the commercialisation of Education (eds.)

6. To achieve the goal of compulsory elementary education Private sectors have to play a major role.

It implies that the BJP-led Government is trying to deny its own responsibility. (eds.)

7. House keeping will be introduced in the school level for the Girl students as a subject.

It clears athe intension of BJP to remind girl in their home rather than to make them self-reliant.

Mr. Murali Monohar Joshi was compelled to drop discussion on making the concept of Hindutva part of the curriculum, cancel the presentation by calcutta-based Sympathizer, Mr. P D Chitlangia, and restrict debate to the relalively non-controversial "first 20 pages" of agenda notes.

The HRD minister surrendered to the will of a majority of education ministers, even including those belonging to BJP allies, TDP and Akali Dal who twice walked out of the conference.

Worse, Mr. Atal Behari Vajpayee tried tried to dissociate himself completely from the HRD ministry’s "saffronisation-of-education" moves. In a speech that rejected mixing religion with education, the Prime Minister stressed on understanding and respect for all faiths in India. "We should keep in mind our diversity of religion, language and ethnicity…," he said.

Trouble for Mr. Joshi began with the proceedings, Mr. K.Pratibha Bharati, Andra Pradesh higher education minister, objected to the Saraswati Vandana – to be rendered in place of the National Anthem by handicapped children of the Rashtriya Viranjaina Andh kanya Vidyalaya.

She was joined by others – and slogans were raised against Mr. Chitlangia’s scheduled address. As the ministry decided to go ahead with the vandana, Congress, Left, RJD, TDP and Akali Dal Ministers walked out. Mr. Atal Behari Vajpayee, waiting to deliver the inaugural address, stood helplessly by.

The HRD Minister agreed only to "Consider" the demand, not "Concedc" it. And ministers from Punjab, Bihar, West Bengal, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Assam, Tripura, Meghalaya and Madhya Pradesh accompanied Ms Bharathi in walking out again.

About noon, Mr. Joshi emerged from the conference room. He spoke to the Ministers for about 15 minutes, and announced that discussions would be confined to the non-contentious first 20 pages of the agenda notes, and that Mr. Chitlanjia would not make his presentation.