[HelenTay]

In a setback to the Jayalalithaa government on the school text books row, the Supreme Court on Thursday gave a virtual go ahead for implementation of the common curriculum scheme and ordered the state to distribute by August 2 the nine crore books published at the cost of `200 crore among the students.

Fearing that the row arising mainly on political lines was bound to “adversely” affect the interests of 1.8 crore school students in the state, a bench comprising Justices J.M. Panchal, Deepak Verma and B.S. Chauhan declined the state government’s plea for staying the Madras High Court verdict striking down an amendment brought in the law by the AIADMK administration to regulate the scheme.

Though the Madras high court had allowed the state government to make alterations in the books to remove any objection por tions relating to forme chief minister M. Karuna nidhi, his daughter Kanimo zhi and their DMK party's political ideology, the AIADMK government stil was against the distribution of the books claiming tha entire curriculum drawn during the earlier regime was “substandard”.

The common curriculam drawn by the DMK government for all types of the schools in the state — state board, matriculation, Anglo-Indian and oriental–named as “samacheer kalvi” in Tamil, had run into the rough weather as several private schools had raised serious objections to the “substandard” syllabus.

This was also reflected in the arguments of their counsel in the SC as they said that it would have serious consequences for school education if the syllabus was not redrawn and improved further. The SC took into consideration the fact that the AIADMK government had chosen to dump the textbooks printed already at a cost of `200 crore for the common syllabus system.

“What will happen to `200 crore?... Would you allow the books to rot in the stores or burn them?” the court demanded from TN’s counsel P.P. Rao.


- dc chennai

[theonsushv]

Dear Forum mates,

The Apex Court can very well decide if the quality of the books prepared by the previous government is "substandard" or not. If the Apex court has given verdict that the books can be issued,
then definitely the quality could not have been of "sub standard". In the tug of war going between Legislature and Judiciary, the school children should not be victimized.

Hope forum mates will agree my view.

In a setback to the Jayalalithaa government on the school text books row, the Supreme Court on Thursday gave a virtual go ahead for implementation of the common curriculum scheme and ordered the state to distribute by August 2 the nine crore books published at the cost of `200 crore among the students.

Fearing that the row arising mainly on political lines was bound to “adversely” affect the interests of 1.8 crore school students in the state, a bench comprising Justices J.M. Panchal, Deepak Verma and B.S. Chauhan declined the state government’s plea for staying the Madras High Court verdict striking down an amendment brought in the law by the AIADMK administration to regulate the scheme.

Though the Madras high court had allowed the state government to make alterations in the books to remove any objection por tions relating to forme chief minister M. Karuna nidhi, his daughter Kanimo zhi and their DMK party's political ideology, the AIADMK government stil was against the distribution of the books claiming tha entire curriculum drawn during the earlier regime was “substandard”.

The common curriculam drawn by the DMK government for all types of the schools in the state — state board, matriculation, Anglo-Indian and oriental–named as “samacheer kalvi” in Tamil, had run into the rough weather as several private schools had raised serious objections to the “substandard” syllabus.

This was also reflected in the arguments of their counsel in the SC as they said that it would have serious consequences for school education if the syllabus was not redrawn and improved further. The SC took into consideration the fact that the AIADMK government had chosen to dump the textbooks printed already at a cost of `200 crore for the common syllabus system.

“What will happen to `200 crore?... Would you allow the books to rot in the stores or burn them?” the court demanded from TN’s counsel P.P. Rao.


- dc chennai

[HelenTay]

Sadly it is going to be the children who are going to bear the brunt as this does not look like ending soon.