New Delhi, July 14
Following day-long discussions on the SK Thorat panel suggestions to remove 21 politically and communally sensitive cartoons from senior secondary school textbooks, NCERT’s apex academic body today slammed the report as “deeply inadequate” and said it didn’t offer cogent intellectual arguments for the deletion of cartoons.

The National Monitoring Committee (NMC) of the National Council of Education Research and Training, which debated the Thorat report for five hours today, will formally respond to its recommendations by July 23.

Based on NMC’s response, NCERT director Parveen Sinclair in consultation with the council’s Textbook Development Committee will take the decision on which of the 38 recommended modifications to be effected in the textbooks in question.

The NMC, meanwhile, asked the NCERT today to set up a long-term review mechanism for NCERT books and authorised the director to make changes in the six books in question.

Of the modifications recommended by the Thorat panel, 21 relate to the removal of sensitive cartoons and 17 to the alterations of captions accompanying certain illustrations in six NCERT social science textbooks of levels IX to XII.

The NCERT had set up the Thorat committee to review the books after politicians objected to some cartoons. The first one to raise a storm showed Dr BR Ambedkar seated on a snail and former PM Jawaharlal Nehru whipping the snail.

The Thorat panel admitted that the books under review were well-conceived and the cartoons they used were in accordance to the National Curriculum Framework (NCF) 2005’s mandate of enhanced learning through better tools. It nevertheless suggested the removal of some cartoons, citing their offensive tone.