Against Communalisation of Education

The 17th Congress of the CPI(M) expresses grave concern that the sphere of education has become a major target of the communal-fascistic forces represented by the RSS-led Sangh Parivar and the BJP-led NDA regime. The communalisation of education is an integral part of the RSS agenda to turn India into a theocratic Hindu Rashtra. The BJP-led regime is making concerted efforts to reverse the secular and scientific character of the education system in a highly arbitrary and authoritarian manner, bypassing the legitimate academic bodies and without the sanction of Parliament and the state governments, although education is primarily a state subject. Soon after coming to power at the centre, the BJP-led government effected a virtual RSS take-over of all important institutions of research and education, such as the Indian Council of Historical Research (ICHR), Indian Council of Social Science Research (ICSSR), Institute of Advanced Studies, University Grants Commission (UGC), National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT), National Institute of Educational Planning and Administration (NIEPA), Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) and so on. The aim was to communalise the syllabi and content of school education and to influence the direction and priorities of research to advance the RSS objective of transforming secular democratic India into a rabidly intolerant Hindu Rashtra. The fascistic ideology of the Sangh Parivar is based on communal hatred of the religious minorities. Through the communalisation of education, the RSS is attempting to systematically influence the consciousness of the impressionable younger generation so as to perpetuate its divisive ideology. A parallel school system of over 20,000 Vidya Bharati institutions operating throughout the country indicates the seriousness with which the RSS is pursuing its pernicious aims. Feudal and Brahminical religious values and rituals, rabid hatred against minorities, defence of the caste system and an anti-Dalit bias, patriarchal attitude to women, glorification of reactionary and obscurantist practices like child marriage, sati, dowry etc., distortion and falsification of history and negation of the scientific temper – these elements form the core of the educational content in the RSS-run schools. Now, with state power in its hands, it is making a brazen attempt to impose this rotten core on the educational system of the country as a whole. In higher education, while pleading a resource crunch for rejecting all legitimate educational demands on the one hand, huge sums are being earmarked for new courses in karmakand, vedic astrology and yogic consciousness on the other. All these dubious courses are, moreover, being pushed through the entire university system. Besides, crores of rupees are being siphoned off from government funds for aiding organizations linked to the RSS. A communalised rewriting of history, including the gross falsification of the history of our glorious freedom struggle, to suit its political agenda and the concoction and communal interpretation of archaeological evidence to justify its destruction of places of worship of the minorities is central to the RSS-dominated educational policy that is being pushed through by the BJP-led central government. In this background, the 17th Congress of the CPI(M) welcomes the recent verdict of the Supreme Court staying the implementation of the national curriculum framework on school education prepared by the NCERT, which was to have come into effect from April this year. This, however, cannot be a cause for complacency as the communal forces are subverting this by all means. The 17th Congress of the CPI(M) also welcomes the initiative that was earlier taken by the Left Front government of West Bengal in convening a successful meeting of chief ministers and education ministers of non-BJP-ruled states, which adopted a joint resolution opposing the central government’s drive to communalise education. The 17th Congress of the CPI(M) strongly condemns all the above aspects of the communalisation of education under NDA rule, calls upon all secular sections of the people and the academic community to resist this nefarious design tooth and nail, and calls for a massive and sustained nationwide campaign to rebuff this diabolical ideological offensive that strikes at the very roots of a secular and united India.