KARNAL: Replace sex-education with lessons on character building- thats the message of Dinanath Batra- the president of RSS-backed Shiksha Bachao Andolan Samiti, a decorated recipient of the Rashatrapati Award, and the man whose name has been proposed by the Haryana government to head a panel of experts to suggest changes in the states education system.
Mr Batra an increasingly vocal person in Indias education system and a self-appointed custodian of traditional Indian values is convinced that sex-education will pollute young minds. He denied that sex-education had any role in creating awareness about sexually-transmitted diseases (STDs), personal hygiene etc among adolescents. Instead, we should focus on character building among students. After all he argues, You cannot imagine how a woman teacher or a girl student would react to such an expression (read sex-education) in a class!
Sex, to Mr Batra is a bad word. A taboo that should be kept under wraps, lest it corrupt the innocence of school-goers. Presenting the keynote address at the national workshop on Review of Right to Education sponsored by the Indian Council of Social Science Research (ICSSR) at the Budha College of Education at Rambha village, near Karnal, Haryana he said on Saturday, 14 Feb that the concept of sex, must not find any space in the improved Indianised education system.
The mere expression of the word sex would lead to deviation of attention in innocent minds, he maintains.
Batra, infamously nicknamed book auditor for his legal battles against leading publishers and authors contesting on behalf of Indian values, was in the news most recently after he forced Penguin Books India to pulp American scholar Wendy Doniger’s book The Hindus: An Alternative History.
Meanwhile, his own fortunes have been improving. Eight textbooks written by Batra have been introduced into the school curriculum by the State School Textbook Board, in Gujarat- Prime Minister Narendra Modis home state.
And he has no qualms in admitting: I certainly want to saffronise the entire Indian education with ample space for other religious texts. While I firmly support introduction of selected chapters of Bhagavad Gita in schools, I also support the idea of taking texts on moral education from all religions which are aimed at building a humane and enlightened society.
Batra says he has already offered detailed suggestions to the human resource development ministry for bringing value-based changes in the education system. His priority is to redesign curricula and textbooks from what he calls the Indian point of view.
Following my lawsuits NCERT had to delete 75 objectionable passages and references against Indian martyrs and different communities from various textbooks. These offensive texts were written by the foreign writers from their perspective but students have been reading them for more than a decade, he lamented.
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