Saffronisation charge politically motivated: Joshi

BEIJING, AUG. 24. The Human Resource Development Minister, Dr. Murli Manohar Joshi, today dismissed Opposition charges of saffronisation of the education system as ``politically motivated'' to create a division within the National Democratic Alliance.

The hue and cry is based on total distortion and with a pure political intention, Dr. Joshi told PTI here before concluding his visit to China to attend the E-9 ministerial review meeting of the world's nine most populated countries. It is purely a political agenda to create a divide between the NDA and its partners. It will not succeed, he said.

``During the debate in Parliament (on Monday), I clearly told them (the critics) that if anyone can show a single deviation from the approved National Education Policy of 1986, the Programme of Action of 1992 and the report of the Standing Committee of Human Resource Development Ministry, I will rectify that. But nobody has come forward,'' he said.

Moreover, Dr. Joshi said he had written to all political leaders to debate the NCERT document in their respective party fora and respond. ``They have not responded'' and there has been no rejection of the document either, he said. The CPI(M) and Sahmat were making a noise about the issue with a purely political motive, he said.

Dr. Joshi said the Government would lay stress on value education which had become necessary in view of some disturbing tendencies in educational institutions. He said violent activities in educational institutions and cases of disrespect to teachers and girls have caught his attention.

Dr. Joshi said even the UNESCO has favoured value education and learning from within to promote social and moral values. Explaining the term ``within'', he said it meant there was some sort of spiritual content in the education and that was value.

``Values cannot come out of anything. I believe that values come out of spirituality which is a universal common phenomenon,'' he said. Commenting on the just-concluded E-9 ministerial meeting, Dr. Joshi said several suggestions made by India has been incorporated in the final E-9 Beijing declaration. India suggested that the E-9 countries should ensure the inculcation of human, environmental and ethical values in all fields of basic education with a view to realising the goals of education for all and the all-round development of the individual in society. Under future commitments of the E-9 group, the role of education in poverty reduction as well as the promotion of social and economic growth, non-violence, tolerance, social justice and respect for cultural diversity was added. Another point India stressed during the meeting was to give attention to holistic early childhood care and education to ensure that every child realised his/her potential, he said. The meeting was attended by Ministers and officials from the world's nine most populous developing countries - China, India, Bangladesh, Brazil, Egypt, Indonesia, Mexico, Nigeria and Pakistan.

- PTI

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