SHILLONG, MAY 4: The Hynniewtrep Youth Council (HYC) has demanded the state government to set up a magisterial inquiry into the alleged “criminal conspiracy” to destroy the image of the Meghalaya Board of School Education and the education department.
This was following the detection of numerous factual errors and misleading information in most of the school textbooks prescribed by the MBOSE.
Prior to the current academic year, the MBOSE had undertaken an exercise to review and change the syllabus and textbooks. Subsequently, certain publishers were given work orders for supplying of books as approved by the board.
A delegation of the HYC led by its general secretary Robertjune Kharjahrin and education secretary Roy Kupar Synrem met the Education Minister Lahkmen Rymbui for his necessary intervention into the matter here on Friday.
The leaders in a memorandum submitted to Rymbui states – “The scale of these errors and misleading information is up to the extent which we may reach into a conclusion that it was done with a conspiracy, ill motive and with a malafide intention to mislead the students, defame and malign the prestige of the MBOSE and the education department of the state as a whole.”
Stating that this is an offence of criminal conspiracy which is a crime as per law and hence needs to be punished accordingly, they said, “An independent inquiry by a magistrate or by a special investigation team is needed to find out the truth behind these rampant errors.”
Speaking to reporters, Kharjahrin said that the Council also wanted the inquiry to investigate into the angle whether the exercise was done for “election funding”.
He said that the exercise to change the textbooks and publishing of the same was carried in hurried manner and was completed within a short span of only 4-5 months.
The HYC general secretary informed that the education minister has assured the delegation that he would examine the proposal and if needed will consider instituting an inquiry into the matter.
Asked, Kharjahrin however said that if the state government fails to pay heed to the demand, the Council will be compelled to file a public interest ligitation (PIL) before the Meghalaya High Court for its intervention.
“We may also file a First Information Report with the police department because from the way we see it, this is a pre-planned move which the sole target is to destroy the image of the MBOSE and the state’s education department,” he said.
Earlier, NGOs had also demanded the board to stop publication and use of the social science textbooks for class IX after it was found to be full of errors which include misrepresentation of facts about the Khasi indigenous community.
It may be mentioned here that the main objective of the MBOSE to change the school textbooks was to provide quality education to the students’ community in the state, which however has failed miserably in the process.
By Our Reporter
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