The National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT) has gone over the Class 12 Political Science textbook to edit the portion about Jammu and Kashmir. The chapter revised is titled ‘Politics in India since Independence’ for session 2020-21.
The topic ‘Separatism and Beyond’, that included Article 370 which gave Jammu and Kashmir its exceptionally autonomous state, has been deleted, replacing it with the topic ‘Regional Aspirations’. This was done as the state no longer has the same status, with Article 370, alongside Article 34, being abolished.
The deleted part in the book read that one strand of separatists who want a separate Kashmiri nation, independent of India and Pakistan. Then there are groups that want Kashmir to merge with Pakistan. Besides these, there is a third strand, which wants greater autonomy for the people of the state within the Indian union. After this, the book says that President’s Rule imposed in June 2018 after the BJP withdrew its support to the Mehbooba Mufti government and concludes with the mentions the withdrawal of Article 370.
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The new edition says that the Jammu and Kashmir had a special status under Article 370 of the Indian Constitution. However, in spite of it, the region witnessed violence, cross-border terrorism and political instability with internal and external ramifications. The revised portion further reads that the Article resulted in the loss of many lives, including that of innocent civilians, security personnel and militants. Besides, there was also a large scale displacement of Kashmiri Pandits from the Kashmir valley.
On August 5, 2019, Parliament had approved a resolution abrogating special status to Jammu and Kashmir under Article 370 of the Constitution. The state was also bifurcated into two Union territories — Ladakh with no Legislative Assembly and Jammu and Kashmir with one. The book has also been updated with the developments that took place in Jammu and Kashmir after 2002.
Also, this month opposition blamed CBSE of promoting a particular ideology as CBSE dropped several topics from its curriculum. The opposition opposed this move of CBSE and said that India’s democracy and plurality are being scrapped. However, CBSE claims that this is being done only for this year due to the pandemic. Also, CBSE told that this reduction of the syllabus is not restricted to one subject as some people are trying to show.
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