Here is the concerned TOI article about Ekal Vidyalaya reproduced in toto.
Now that you say you have no problems about the TOI article but about
my conclusions based on it, here are my arguments again.
"Sorry, the letters 'E', 'F', 'Q', 'W', 'X' and 'Z' don't exist in the primer,
but since there aren't any names of Hindu gods beginning with those letters,
they're probably not worth bothering about anyway."
Please tell me : is this education or religious brainwashing ?
"Popli's version of Birsa Munda's life would definitely be an eye-opener to
subaltern historians. He writes: "Birsa studied in a missionary school;
converted to Christianity; was made to eat beef and forced to cut his tuft in
hostel; returned home upset; began worshipping tulsi, wore sacred thread;
roamed in forests; struggled against missionaries, landlords and British
government...arrested, slowly poisoned in jail." Popli's book also contains a
series of rhymes on cow, Ram-Sita and other Gods of Hindu pantheon."
Isnt the above spreading poison about Christianity in young minds ?
"Not all teachers of EVs were content with merely propagating communal
education. For instance, during their visit to a EV in Jharkhand's Tantnagar
block of Singhbhum district, the inquiry team was told by a teacher (Manney
Singh Kandiyan) of "how he, with his other colleagues, destroyed the half-built
church in 2002". Kandiyan also told the inquiry team that charges against him
were dropped at the behest of the ruling party."
And look at the above. A teacher brags to an inquiry committee member how he
destroyed a church. Is it too difficult to extrapolate based on the above what
would the teacher imbibing into the young children's minds ?
Santosh, I fail to understand why I have to state the obvious.
regards,
Samir
C for cow, R for Ram, U for Uma...
22 Apr 2005, 0950 hrs IST, Akshaya Mukul , TNN
NEW DELHI: A for Arjun , B for Brahma , C for Cow, D for Dhruva , G for Ganesh
, H for Hanuman ...J for Jambavant ..M for Mahadev ...R for Ram ...T for
Temple, U for Uma . Aaj Somwar Hai, Shivji ka var hai; sache man se bhajan
karenge, sabka bera par hai; aaj mangalwar hai, hanumanji ka var hai....
If you missed this 'Hindi-Hindu-Hindustan' version of an English primer and
school prayer, head for any of the thousands of VHP-run Ekal Vidyalayas (EV) in
BJP-ruled Jharkhand. Sorry, the letters 'E', 'F', 'Q', 'W', 'X' and 'Z' don't
exist in the primer, but since there aren't any names of Hindu gods beginning
with those letters, they're probably not worth bothering about anyway.
Being run for the past many years by Friends of Tribal Society and other front
organisations of the Sangh from a direct grant by the union HRD ministry, the
communal curriculum and content of these schools have come to light in a report
by a four-member inquiry committee of the HRD ministry.
The above illustrations are only a glimpse of how the HRD ministry under M M
Joshi carried out a systematic programme to...
...Hinduise primary education, particularly in states like Jharkhand where
Christian missionaries have been working among tribals for long.
The report, submitted by Avdesh Kaushal, Dipak Malik, P Sudhir Kumar and K R
Meena, also shows how the EVs were being used to siphon off funds obtained as
grants.
The Ekal Vidyalayas were siphoning off funds from the HRD ministry in the guise
of providing non-formal education and learning material to village children.
For instance, the team found that the school attendance register in some EVs
were identical copies of those in government schools in the same villages.
Obviously, the students couldn't have been attending both schools and the EV
registers existed merely to justify grants.
Further, a base book ( Khele, Kude, Nache, Gaye ) for training teachers of EVs
was written by one Rakesh Popli who was also a member of the grants-in-aid
committee of the HRD ministry that decided which NGOs would be given funds for
running these schools.
Popli's version of Birsa Munda's life would definitely be an eye-opener to
subaltern historians. He writes: "Birsa studied in a missionary school;
converted to Christianity; was made to eat beef and forced to cut his tuft in
hostel; returned home upset; began worshipping tulsi, wore sacred thread;
roamed in forests; struggled against missionaries, landlords and British
government...arrested, slowly poisoned in jail." Popli's book also contains a
series of rhymes on cow, Ram-Sita and other Gods of Hindu pantheon.
Not all teachers of EVs were content with merely propagating communal
education. For instance, during their visit to a EV in Jharkhand's Tantnagar
block of Singhbhum district, the inquiry team was told by a teacher (Manney
Singh Kandiyan) of "how he, with his other colleagues, destroyed the half-built
church in 2002". Kandiyan also told the inquiry team that charges against him
were dropped at the behest of the ruling party.
