By Our Correspondent
BHUBANESWAR: A student protest was held at Lower PMG today by AIDSO demanding complete withdrawal of unscientific curriculum and faulty textbooks prepared on the basis of National Education Policy-2020 and distribution of new textbooks to the students, exemplary punishment to all officials involved in publishing faulty textbooks including the Minister of Public Education, and complete cancellation of National Education Policy-2020 which is destroying education. Despite the dire need for good government education in a tribal-dominated state like Odisha, the previous government closed more than seven thousand primary schools and the current double-engine government is far from opening them, rather the process of closing them is in progress.
On the other hand, thousands of posts of teachers and education staff are lying vacant in the state. Primary education in the state is in a complete state of disrepair. Therefore, today the people of the state are losing faith in government institutions. In this situation of government education, changing the curriculum from class 1 to 8 based on the National Education Policy – 2020 and preparing new textbooks and finding about 1700 errors in those textbooks has raised huge questions about the government education system. If we look a little closer, even more errors will come out.
Basically, a fundamental change has been made in the curriculum by inserting many unscientific, illogical and fabricated stories into the curriculum. Due to this, the students will not only get factually incorrect education but will also get distorted education, which will severely hamper their thinking ability. As a result, by receiving such unscientific and incorrect education, the future of millions of tender-minded students of the state will not only be dark, but they will also become victims of blindness, stupidity and this will help in destroying government education and paving the way for privatization and commercialization of education, said student leaders at a protest meeting held at the student protest venue.
Today’s student protest was led by AIDSO State President Somnath Behera, secretary Siddhartha Rath, Vice-President Nirupma Behera, Bhagyagirabhi Das, Office secretary Nasim Sarkar, Treasurer Saptarshini Rawal, Editors Sangma members Paramananda Sahu, Vinod Sethi, Ayutsa Sahu, Narayan Nayak, Narayan Sahu and State Committee members Kisan Sahu, Avinash Pradhan, Shivani Sahu, Jyotsnarani Das. A representative from the protest site submitted a demand letter to the Chief Minister. AIDSO has warned that a strong student movement will be organized if the government does not immediately withdraw the unscientific curriculum and faulty textbooks and distribute new textbooks to the students.
