Karna­taka Government gives in, agrees to drop changes to textbooks

Highlights

• Under mounting pressure from various quarters, the state government has finally decided to drop some changes made by the controversial Rohit Chakrathirtha-led Textbook Revision Committee in school textbooks.The Education Department has dropped ten recommendations made by the committee. But since the textbooks have been printed already, these changes will be printed as a booklet and will be supplied to the schools across the state. A soft copy will be made available to the teachers on official websites.

• While Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai said he was satisfied with the changes made and claimed that all corrections suggested by former prime minister H.D. Deve Gowda have been incorporated, Opposition Leader Siddaramaiah termed the exercise “shoddy patchwork to correct errors in a few places”.

• It may be recalled that Primary and Secondary Education Minister B C Nagesh had on December 17 last year issued a circular that in a chapter in class 6 social science textbook “some non-essential portions which exceeded the mental capacity of the students” should be referred to an expert committee for revision. The content objected to was on page 82 and 83 and was titled ‘Speaking about reason for coming up of new religions.’ Now the changes suggested by the committee are being dropped following widespread protests and objections. In the revised class 9 social science textbook a chapter ‘Our Constitution,’ speaks about the drafting of the Constitution but omits the title of ‘Architect of the Constitution’ to Dr B R Ambedkar and will therefore be reinserted.

Portions on mutts reinserted

In

class 7 social science textbook, a chapter on ‘Religion and Faith’ spe­aks about ‘Sufi Saints and Bhakti Cults or Mov­e­ments.’’ The review com­mittee had asked for the deletion of certain por­tions related to Bha­kti movement and Sufi saints which will now be rein­se­rted. In class 7 Kan­nada textbook, a chapter ‘Gom­be Kalisuva Nitihi’, a doll teaching values which was wron­gly attributed to RN Jayagopal has now been rightly attributed to Chi Uday Shankar.

In class 6 social science textbook a chapter ‘Our Pride Karna­taka’, portions related to Siddaganga Mutt and Adi Chunchangiri Mutt and their contributions are being reinserted. In class 7 social science textbook which talks about Mysore kingdom, a portion related to Surpur Nayaks will be reinserted. In class 9 social science textbook, relating to the change makers of India, the contributions of Shri Basavanna are being reinserted. In class 7 social science textbook, the por­t­raits of Rashtr­akavi Kuv­e­mpu and Huilgol Narayan Rao related to reunific­ation of Karnataka have been reinserted.