Author: HT Correspondent
Publication: The Hindustan Times
Date: November 24, 2001
Despite repeated Opposition charges
of tampering with State's school textbooks to incorporate a heavy dose
of red ideology, the Left Front Government's education department refuses
to take heed.
The West Bengal government's educational
policy came under close scrutiny a few month ago when opposition parties
pointed out in the Assembly that while the State government is "protesting
against the saffronization of the school syllabus" by the Centre, they
are doing the same at the State level. Only that here, a heavy dose of
communism was being incorporated in the history textbooks and communist
leaders were being glorified.
The complaints were raised mainly
against the syllabus of modern history. While a brief version of the same
is taught in Class V of the State schools, in class VIII again, modern
history is taught with more depth. Here, along with the French Revolution,
Fall of Bismark, and the first and second world wars, Russian history is
also present.
While the Trinamul Chhatra Parishad
continues to complain against the "overdose of communism in the syllabus
of the school children", Professor Refatullah, the Director of the State
Council of Educational Research and Training said, "it is not correct to
say that the history of communism has been given extra stress.
In the syllabus of class VIII, while
on one hand there is the mention of the comments of Marx in relation to
the Industrial revolution, on the other hand the October revolution and
the November struggle in Russia and the consequential fall of the Czars
have been mentioned in the book. All this constitutes a very little portion
of the entire book, so the claim that stress has been laid on the communists
in the text books is not true".
So while people have complained
that new chapters are being contemplated to be included in the syllabus,
the SCERT authorities say it is to maintain parity with other states and
a continuity in the syllabus of the primary, secondary and higher secondary
levels. "It is baseless to claim that we are trying to redo the syllabus
to enhance the virtues of communism" Refatullah said.
