Chandigarh: Former Punjab Chief Minister Sardar Parkash Singh Badal said here today that the Punjab CM Captain Amarinder Singh “is lying in his claim that the decision to delete Sikh history from the books meant for Class 12 of the Punjab Education Board was taken in 2013 during the Akali-BJP regime.”
“ All the chapters on Punjab and Sikh history which they have deleted now continued to be taught to class 12 students through the SAD-BJP regime including the period from 2013 to 2017?”, he said, adding thatnew books for class 12 minus chapters on Punjab history including the Sikh Guru Sahibaan were being printed only now. Why? If the decision to exclude all these chapters on Punjab and Sikh history was taken during the SAD-BJP regime in 2013, then how come it was still being taught up to 2017? ” Mr Badal asked Captain Amarinder Singh.
Badal also advised the CM to read the old books and the new to see when the changes had been made and what were the changes.“The sad fact is that they have removed Sikh history and replaced it with the history of the Congress party,” said Mr Badal.
Badal said that it was ridiculous that the CM had changed his stance within 24 hours.” He first said that no chapters had been deleted from class 12 and that these had only been shifted from class 12 to Class 11. Now, he is falsely claiming that the decision on the new syllabus was taken in 2013. The officers are putting the CM in an awkard situation. Instead of defending his officers, he should have stood by Sikh history and ordered an independent inquiry into the whole incident,” said Mr Badal
Badal said that the CM should have accepted the Akali challenge and should have produced by now both the old and new books for classes 11 and 12 for comparison before the media. Badal also asked the CM to read the acknowledgements page in the new book which gives credit for the change to the new team of 2018. “ This will show him who has brought about the changes. The acknowledgement page admits that the changes have been made only now and the new team is claiming “credit” for it. I think they did not show this page to the CM,” said
Badal. Referring to CM’s claim that chapters on Sikh history had been shifted to class 11, Badal said this was a misleading statement because class 11 books already contained chapters on Punjab and Sikh history and there were additional 23 chapters in class 12 with detailed study of Punjab and the Sikh history with pictorial illustrations. All these 23 chapters have been dropped from both class 11 and class 12 books,” said Badal.
“As a historian himself, Captain Amarinder Singh would have known that history is taught at different levels in different classes. In fact, the teaching of history begins at home and goes on at deeperand more detailed and advanced levels as students progress through the classes. It includes brief introductory passages in one class and detailed studies in the higher classes. That was the case earlier. Now they have just limited it to introductory passages in class 11 which were already there and they have removed the detailed chapters from class 12. Why? This is what the CM needs to look into,” said the former CM
Referring to the CM’s claim that the decision on changing the syllabus was taken during the Akali regime, Badal said, “ How simplistic and brazen can you get ? If the syllabus deleting the said chapters was taken during the Akali regime, we would have changed the books then. How come that all the chapters on Guru Sahiban and the rest of the Sikh history were being taught as part of the syllabus forClass 12 school children all through the Akali regime from 2013 to 2017? Why have these chapters been dropped and replaced with chapters on Congress history only now under the Congress regime? Why did the present Government not continue with the books containing detailed Punjab history including the history of the Sikh Gurus, Banda Singh Bahadur and Maharaja Ranjit Singh plus the history of all the Sikh movements which formed a part of the syllabus for class 12 all
through the Akali regime?” asked Badal.
Badal asked Captain Amarinder Singh if he wanted the people to believe that the Akalis would delete Sikh history to include the history of the Congress party which was responsible for army assault and genocide of the Sikhs ? Nothing could be more ridiculous than this and the CM should have not allowed himself to be misled by his officers,” said Mr Badal.
The former Chief Minister said that the correct course even now for the CM was to order the continuance of the old syllabus and books and to get an independent inquiry conducted into who was behind the mischief. “I am surprised that he is defending the culprits and thus becoming a party to the dispute,” said Mr Badal.