The controversy over change in syllabus of Class XI and XII is yet still not history.
As the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) intensified its tirade against the Congress-led Punjab Government for messing with the past, three Cabinet Ministers — Finance Minister Manpreet Badal, Education Minister OP Soni, and Cooperation Minister Sukhjinder Randhawa — on Thursday diverted the storm towards the private publishers by accusing them for generating the controversy.
At the same time, the Minister-trio apologized on the government’s behalf for use of inappropriate words in Class XII books being published by it before undertaking to rectify the mistakes, and not repeating the same in future.
Claiming that no omission was made in the Punjab history, especially that of guru sahibaans, Finance Minister maintained that only the syllabus has been bifurcated in two classes — that is Class XI and XII.
Education Minister also announced that in the coming days, all the guides, by the private publishers, will be banned and the Punjab School Education Board (PSEB) will publish all its books in the future.
“Till now, the PSEB was only prescribing the syllabus, but from now on, it has been decided that the board will publish all books and made the same available to the students at low rates,” said Manpreet, adding that may be all this controversy is generated by these private publishers who had created a mafia to loot people by selling books on high rates as they would be a suffered lot now.
Defending his government on the issue, Manpreet said that the history subject is compulsory till Class X, while for Class XI and XII, the history subject is elective. “The entire history regarding guru sahibaans is included in Class X, and there after it was aligned with the national level history to enable our students compete at the national level when they go for higher studies,” he said.
Notably, about two lakh students of Classes XI and XII opt for the History subject every year.
“The syllabus is based on themes, covering all the period concerned…No aspect, which was being taught earlier, has been left out. It is just that the same has been bifurcated in two classes,” said Dr Jasbir Singh from Panjab University — an expert present along with the Ministers and involved in the process of aligning the syllabus.
Dr Jasbir said that in fact, the history regarding four sahibzadas and Saragarhi battle has been included this time, which was never ever taught.
In Class XI, six chapters deals with the Punjab history, while in Class XII, only two chapters out of 11 focuses on the state.
Notably, about nine chapters, related to the history and socio-economic conditions of Punjab, Sikh gurus and their teachings, Maharaja Ranjit Singh’s conquests have been included in Class XI under the theme of foundation, evolution and transformation of the Sikh religion. These were earlier the part of Class XII course.
In the same way, chapters dealing with the rise of Dal Khalsa, socio-economic conditions of Punjab under the Mughals, denigration of the Mughal rule in Punjab and Anglo-Sikh relations and wars are all included in one chapter — Towards a Sikh State — in the Class XII history textbook.
APOlOGIsE FOR VOCAB, SPEllING MISTAKE: MINISTERS
Describing the use of inappropriate words as a “huge mistake”, Cabinet Minister Randhawa wasted no time to apologize for the same on Government’s behalf, while avowing that the same will be corrected and ensured that would not happen in future.
“To err is human and we accept if such inappropriate words have been used in the books. We are open to this and will amend it in future too,” he said.
“If any mistake is there is the vocabulary of the book or in the spellings or translation, the government is ready to change it,” said Soni and Manpreet in unison.
SPECIAl ClASSES FOR ClASS XII
The students promoted to Class XII in the current academic session would have missed a slice of history but for the special classes being conducted for them
For the Class XII students of the current session, the Education Minister made it clear that special classes will be organized for these students so that they would not be deprived of the Punjab’s history, which has now been shifted to Class XI.
THE CONTROVERSY
A controversy has erupted over alleged deletion of Punjab history from the PSEB’s Class XII syllabus for history, which is mainly centered on Indian history now. Notably, in PSEB’s new syllabus for History subject for Classes XII and XII, there is allegation that Sikh history has been diluted by deleting most of the 23 chapters pertaining to the Sikh gurus and their teachings from the Class XII history book.