E-Paper
Class 10 question on ‘Jai Shri Ram’ stirs row
The TMC and the BJP also sparred over cut money -- a colloquialism for commission given to local ruling party members by beneficiaries of government schemes -- which the latter highlighted.
The issues of chanting Jai Shri Ram and returning so-called cut money that rocked the political theatre in West Bengal during the recent parliamentary elections found their way into a Bengali test question paper for Class X students in a Hooghly school, provoking protests from the Bharatiya Janata Party in the state.
The students were asked to write pieces on the negative fallout of the slogan and the beneficial impact of returning cut money to people.
A little bit of context here: the BJP, which fought a pitched battle in the Lok Sabha elections in the state against the ruling Trinamool Congress made Jai Shri Ram a rallying cry, prompting a debate in Bengali society and polity on whether the slogan had ever been popular in West Bengal (some said it had; others, not).
The TMC and the BJP also sparred over cut money -- a colloquialism for commission given to local ruling party members by beneficiaries of government schemes -- which the latter highlighted.
The question on the two appeared in a test at the Akna Union High School in Hooghly district about 55 km from Kolkata; students were asked to write a journalistic report on the “harmful effects on the society of chanting Jai Shri Ram” or on the “bold step of the government to stop corruption by returning cut money”.
The students were asked to limit their answer to 150 words; the question carried 5 marks in a test of 40 marks.
The school played down the controversy and said it had sought to address the matter itself.
“No one lodged any complaint but we took steps on our own. We decided to cancel the question. Students attempting the question will be given full marks,” said headmaster Rohit Pyne.
“Subhasish Ghosh, the Bengali teacher who set the question paper has apologised,” added Pyne.
BJP leaders lashed out at both the school authorities and the ruling Trinamool Congress.
“It is clear that the school authorities have taken up the responsibility of beating the drum for the Trinamool Congress. They accuse us of saffronising education, but the people of the state should see what they are doing. The teachers have become slaves of the ruling party,” said Subir Nag, president of Hooghly district organisational unit of the BJP.
Nag also pointed out how in early 2017, the movement of returning the land of the Tata Motors plant in Singur (a protest on this was led by TMC chief Mamata Banerjee, and eventually helped the party wrest power in the state) was made a part of the class 8 history books in the state. Incidentally, as many as six pages of the 10-page chapter entitled “Jami Jal Jangal: Jiban Jibikar Adhikar O Ganaandolan” (Land, water, forests: the right to life and livelihood and mass movements) has been devoted to Mamata Banerjee’s Singur movement.
Though senior TMC leaders chose not to respond, Gopal Roy, the karmadhyakha (official in charge) of education in the Hooghly Zilla Parishad (district council) said: “Current topics are chosen to ask students to write reports (like they would ) for a newspaper,”
However, Nirmal Ghosh, the deputy chief of Akna gram panchayat, who is also a local TMC leader admitted that a question such as this could “confuse students”.
Incidentally, the state government did not ask for cut money to be returned, although chief minister Mamata Banerjee asked those who embezzled funds from government welfare schemes through cut money to return it to the original beneficiaries; , she made the appeal at a party programme (where mainly councillors of the party in the state’s civic bodies were present) and the administrative machinery was not involved in it.
The programme was held on June 18 at Nazrul Mancha, an auditorium in south Kolkata.
