Punish those who committed blunders
A parliamentary standing committee has recommended ensuring exemplary punishment of those responsible for the blunders in this year's school textbooks.
The standing committee on primary and mass education ministry at a meeting yesterday also formed a sub-committee to look into the mistakes in primary textbooks published by the National Curriculum and Textbook Board.
Shamshul Haque Chowdhury was made the convenor while Ali Azam and Mohammad Ilyas were made the members of the sub-committee.
Talking to reporters after the meeting held at the parliament, AKM Zahangir Hossain, member of the standing committee, said the media reported on the errors and that more mistakes would be found if the textbooks were examined carefully.
The director general of directorate of primary education was asked to collect information from the grassroots level and send letters to all district and upazila education officers in this regard, he said, adding the officers would find out the errors and inconsistencies in the textbooks and send the books, following corrections, to the primary and mass education ministry.
"The standing committee thinks the people responsible for the errors will have to be given exemplary punishment. Just transfers will not be enough," said Zahangir.
He said the committee meeting recommended forming a separate body like NCTB and a separate education board for primary education.
Soon after the government started distributing some 36.21 crore copies of textbooks among 4.26 crore students of pre-primary, primary and secondary students on January 1, a sizeable number of errors and anomalies, including spelling mistakes, wrong arrangements of paragraphs and omission of articles, made newspaper headlines.
The issue also triggered a firestorm of protests on Facebook and other social media platforms.
Many alleged that some poems and prose have been dropped from Bangla textbooks of different classes as demanded by Hefajat-e Islam, a Qawmi madrasa-based organisation, and Bangladesh Awami Olema League as those were written by "Hindu" writers and "atheists".
Faced with a volley of criticism, the government made two officers of NCTB Officer on Special Duty (OSD) and suspended its artist/designer. Two separate committees were formed to find out the errors and the people responsible for the mistakes.
Meanwhile, eminent citizens at a roundtable yesterday demanded that the government bring back old pieces in textbooks and remove new additions, alleging that the changes in the textbooks went against the spirit of the Liberation War.
An independent probe commission, comprising noted educationists and experts, needs to be formed to find out the people behind the changes, they said in a five-point demand placed at the roundtable.
Claiming that the textbook changes were a part of conspiracy, they urged the government to find the conspirators and bring them to book.
Sammilito Sangskritik Jote (SSJ), a platform of cultural organisations, arranged the roundtable at the capital's Liberation War Museum (LWM).
Speaking at the roundtable, eminent cultural personality Kamal Lohani said they have to gather people from different professions and wage a movement against the culprits.
A section of educationalists only took money and their names were printed in books. They did not care about the contents, he alleged.
"What a shame!" he said, adding that these so-called educationalists were not concerned about what the children were learning.
Terming changes in the textbooks a “consequence of recent militant attacks”, noted theatre personality Nasiruddin Yousuff said the changes rang alarm bells among people.
Among others, cultural personalities Hasan Imam, Ramendu Majumdar, Mamunur Rashid, columnist Syed Abul Maksud, SSJ President Golam Kuddus and Shyamoli Nasrin Chowdhury, widow of Shaheed Dr Alim Chowdhury, spoke at the event.
Comments