EC Approaches Centre To Vet NCERT Social Science Textbooks

New Delhi: The Election Commission (EC) has told the Centre that it wants to vet social science textbooks of the National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT) for factual mistakes and infirmities. The poll body has said that it wants to check the books for “correctness and relevance” and claimed that the existing content does not prepare students to make “ethical ballot decisions,” according to The Print.

Among the passages in which the poll body has suggested amendments are chapters deleted from Class VI  and X textbooks by the NCERT in 2022. The educational body had deleted the chapters ostensibly to reduce the academic burden on students amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

The deleted chapters are “Key Elements of a Democratic Government” in Class VI and “Popular Struggles and Movements” in Class X.

On the chapter in the Class VI textbook, the EC said that the “elaboration of conflict is totally unnecessary at this tender age”. With respect to the chapter in the Class X book, it contended that the extract spoke “much about conflicts, struggles, popular movements, agitations”, but not as much about involving young people in “citizenship development for electoral participation”, according to the report.

The chapter in the Class VI  book spoke about the concepts of equality and discrimination and made references to the apartheid in South Africa as well as movements led by Dalits, Adivasis and minorities. The deleted chapter in the Class X book referred to the National Alliance for People’s Movements led by activist Medha Patkar as well as anti-monarchy protests in Nepal.

The EC  has been in correspondence with the Ministry of Human Resource Development since 2016 in connection with its proposal to suggest amendments to the textbooks, The Print reported, citing official records. Notably, in 2020, the Ministry of Human Resource Development was renamed the Ministry of Education.