Kharge raises issue of dropping Preamble from NCERT books
Aksheev Thakur
Tribune News Service
New Delhi, August 7
JP Nadda, Leader of the House, and Mallikarjun Kharge, Leader of the Opposition, in Rajya Sabha, today engaged in a spat during Zero Hour in Upper House after the latter raised the issue of dropping Preamble to the Constitution from select NCERT textbooks.
Countering the claim, Nadda stated that the Centre was committed to protecting the Constitution in letter and in spirit.
Kharge slammed the BJP and the RSS claiming they are meddling in school curriculum. He also referred to shifting of statues of Mahatma Gandhi and BR Ambedkar in the Parliament complex.
“The BJP and the RSS are trying to impose their communal ideology on people by tampering with curriculum. The step taken by NCERT is not right,” Kharge said, displaying newspaper clippings of the report on the NCERT issue.
Refuting the charges of the Opposition, Nadda said though he hasn’t seen the textbooks, there was no question of fiddling with the Preamble to the Constitution.
“Word by word, letter by letter, this government under the dynamic leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi is committed to the Constitution,” he said.
Nadda brought up the excesses meted out to the people during the Emergency.
Hitting back further, Nadda said: “I want to remind everyone that the Constitution was attacked on 25 June 1975 (Emergency), and more than 90 times they dismissed the elected government. Your government put 1.25 lakh people in jail for two years.”
He said though the Congress Government tried to ban RSS twice, it emerged stronger. “It is nationalist organisation and was connected to the grassroots. Preamble has been protected and will always be protected,” Nadda said.
Union Minister Dharmendra Pradhan said even new NCERT books carry Preamble.
“In new textbooks, besides Preamble of the Constitution, fundamental duties, fundamental rights, National Anthem and core values of the Constitution have been included,” he said.
Later on X, Kharge posted, “When 140 crore Indians shattered Modi ji’s dream of the slogan ‘400 Paar’ in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, the Modi Government in its frustration is bent on tampering with the Constitution through the backdoor by fiddling with children’s textbooks.”
BJP, RSS meddling in school curriculum: LoP in RS
Mallikarjun Kharge, Leader of the Opposition in Rajya Sabha, slammed the BJP and the RSS claiming that they are meddling in school curriculum.
