False, Sensational Narrative: HRD Minister on CBSE Subjects Row

Let us leave politics out of education and make our politics more educated, Dr Pokhriyal said.

HRD Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal.

(Photo Courtesy: Facebook/@cmnishank)

Amid disquiet over the Central Board of Secondary Education’s one-time decision to drop certain chapters from board exams in 2021, Union Human Resource Development Minister Dr Ramesh Pokhriyal on Thursday, 9 July, said that “uninformed commentary” on the removal of these topics was “sensational” in nature as they had connected topics “selectively” to “portray a false narrative”.

In a series of posts on Twitter, Dr Pokhriyal reiterated CBSE’s clarification that schools have been advised to follow the NCERT Alternate Academic Calendar, while adding that all the topics mentioned have been covered under the same Academic Calendar.

Dr Pokhriyal said that while it is easy to misconstrue exclusion of 3-4 topics like nationalism, local government, federalism, etc and build a false narrative, a wider perusal of different subjects will show that this exclusion is happening across subjects.

Dr Pokhriyal’s comments come on the back of much controversy around CBSE’s decision to drop topics like Citizenship, Federalism, Nationalism, Secularism, Social Movements, Democratic Rights and others chapters from Class 9-12, for purposes of board examination only.

Citing examples to make his case, Dr Pokhriyal said that apart from Political Science, Social Science and Sociology, chapters and topics were also dropped from other subjects.

“The topics excluded in Economics are Measures of Dispersion, Balance of Payments Deficit, etc, while topics excluded in Physics are Heat Engine and Refrigerator, Heat Transfer, Convection and Radiation among others,” he said.

“It is our humble request: education is our sacred duty towards our children. Let us leave politics out of education and make our politics more educated,” he said.