Various students’ organisations in Amravati, including All India Students Federation (AISF) and others, stopped Education minister Mr. Vinod Tawde’s car and showed black flags. He was visiting Amravati on December 27 on the occasion of Bhausaheb Panjabrao Deshmukh’s birth anniversary and the inauguration of Khel Mahotsav in Zila Parishad school. The students were protesting the recent decision of closing down more than 1300 schools in Maharashtra.

In the wake of a Government resolution (GR) released in August 2017, allowing individuals and organisations, specifically companies registered under section 8 of the Companies Act, 2013 to open schools, as many as 1300 government schools with an attendance of less than 10 students face closure. The pilot project for the move has been given to Reliance. The company will be responsible for 130 schools to be opened up as part of this project, said District Secretary of AISF, Himanshu Atkare. The students were also protesting the government’s move towards privatisation and proposed cut off of government jobs by 30%.

The police detained state secretary of AISF, Sagar Duryodhan in the morning of December 27 on preventive detention. Of the 15-20 students present, 12 students were detained. “When we stopped his car, he came out and asked us to submit a letter. How can we submit a letter when we are showing black flags and clearly protesting this move?” asked Himanshu. Students were arrested immediately and released only after filing cases.

The GR proposed earlier that private firms could earn profit from their ‘services’ as so far only public trusts and government and charitable organisations run schools. To this end, the Maharashtra state government also sought amendments to Maharashtra Self-financed Schools (Establishment and Regulation) Act, 2012. According to the government, this move is being made to promote a “competitive era” in the schooling system.

The school education department identified 4353 schools and 69 private schools which have less than 10 students enrolled in them. There are around 28,412 students in these 4422 schools. So far 1314 schools had been identified from where the students and teachers will be shifted out. As per the RTE Act, 2005 primary schools should be within a 1.5-km radius of the student’s residence. It doesn’t matter if the school has very few students. If there are students, then there should be a school. It is being predicated that closing down of schools will make schools inaccessible for students without having an alternate infrastructure in place. Instead of improving the quality of education and ensuring teaching aids and mechanisms that will sustain students’ interests, the government has resorted to the sudden closing down of schools. This move towards privatisation is in line with the Niti Ayog proposal to “hand over schools, colleges, jails to private sector” and will prove disastrous for students from marginalized backgrounds.

Related Articles
https://www.sabrangindia.in/article/mccarthy-era-indian-education
https://www.sabrangindia.in/article/three-years-modi-assault-higher-education
https://www.sabrangindia.in/content/privatization-railways-beneficial
https://www.sabrangindia.in/article/mahapadav-ends-call-prepare-country-wide-indefinite-strike

“All humanists, rationalists and fighters for social and economic justice must unite to fight the usurpers of our democracy and our history”

The post Amravati Students show black flags to Education minister Vinod Tawde appeared first on SabrangIndia.

Taj Mahal: Missing from Maharashtra’s history textbook on Medieval India. Image courtesy: Pinterest.

Following a meeting organized by the state’s Education Minister Vinod Tawde at the Rambhau Mhalgi Prabodhini, an RSS think tank, the Maharashtra Education Board has churned out history textbooks for students of Std VII and IX which are virtually “Muslim-mukt”, the Mumbai Mirror reports.

The Standard VII text book has expunged chapters from the previous edition on the Mughals and Muslim rulers in India before them such as Razia Sultana, Sher Shah Suri and Mohammed bin Tughlaq.

Along with these rulers, also missing from the new textbooks is the architectural heritage they left behind: Taj Mahal, Qutub Minar, Red Fort.

Meanwhile the revised history textbook for Std IX has sections on Bofors and the Emergency declared by Mrs. Indira Gandhi.

Till the last academic year the Std VII history textbook had described Akbar as “a liberal and tolerant administrator who was a patron of learning and art”. The emperor was also described as one who had abolished the jazia tax on non-Muslims, prohibited the practice of sati and tried promoting a new universal religion, Din-e-Ilahi.

The same Akbar is dealt with cursorily in the revised textbook: “Akbar was the most powerful king of the Mughal dynasty. When he tried to bring India under a central authority, he had to face opposition.
Maharana Pratap, Chand Bibi and Rani Durgawati struggled against him. Their struggle is noteworthy”.

With Shivaji and his life as the focal point of the revised textbook, his family members and other Maratha generals have also been accorded generous space.

Speaking to Mumbai Mirror, Sadanand More, chairman of the History subject committee of the Maharashtra State Bureau of Textbook Production and Curriculum Research justified the overhaul of the textbooks: “Why should we not change? We have looked at history from a Maharashtra-centric point of view. It is a natural course as we are from Maharashtra. What’s wrong in that? In fact the Central board books have very little about our state,” More said.

Read the full report in Mumbai Mirror.

The post Emperor Akbar, who’s that? Maharashtra textbooks board churns out ‘Muslim-mukt’ history for schools appeared first on SabrangIndia.