New Delhi: With the recent Bhima Koregaon violence, Una flogging and Rohith Vemula’s death haunting BJP’s ‘development for all’ agenda, the BJP ministers is going out of the way to shun the tag ahead of the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. A new addition to the list is the inclusion of ‘Panchteerth’ in the CBSE syllabus. The term is used to collectively refer to five places which portray the life history of B R Ambedkar.
The Union minister of Social Justice and Empowerment Thaawarchand Gehlot wrote to the Human Resource Development minister Prakash Javadekar last week, requesting him to include ‘Panchteerth’ in CBSE. The NCERT textbooks already cover various aspects of Ambedkar’s life and contribution. However, inclusion of ‘Panchteerth’ will give an in-depth knowledge on Ambedkar’s life history.
Gehlot is of the opinion that the change will help in spreading awareness about the work done by the government to honour Ambedkar.
The 'Panchteerth' includes: Amedbkar’s birthplace in Mhow, the place in London where he stayed while studying in United Kingdom, ‘Deeksha Bhoomi’ in Nagpur, where he embraced Buddhism, ‘Mahaparinirvan Sthal’ in Delhi, where he died on December 6, 1956, and the last one, ‘Chaitya Bhoomi’ in Mumbai where he was cremated.
In 2016, the government decided to include the five places as ‘Panchteerth’, which was taken as appropriation of Ambedkar’s legacy. At the time of the event in Vigyan Bhawan, PM Modi had reportedly said that the good things done by government don’t make it to media.
Modi government has tried to reach out to the followers of Ambedkar earlier as well. In 2014, he visited Mhow to participate in 125th birth anniversary of the father of the Indian Constitution. While speaking about policy initiatives and legislative measures like harnessing maritime strengths and creating waterways, the Prime Minister said that the vision for developing India’s maritime potential was first conceived by Ambedkar.
As the government continues to reach out to the SCs, the NCRB data shows how the crimes against the Dalits are rising. According to the NCRB data crimes against SCs have seen a rise, in 2014 the crime incidences against SCs were 40,401, 2015 38,670, and in 2016 40,801. The crime rate was 20.1 in 2014, 19.2 in 2015, and 20.3 in 2016. In 2017 there have been heinous crimes against the SCs and STs, and the year 2018 started with Bhima Koregaon protests in Maharasthra.
Comments
0 comment