Nehru's picture replaced by Savarkar's in Goa textbooks, claims NSUI

Panaji, July 26: The Goa unit of the NSUI has alleged that a picture of former Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru has been replaced by Hindutva ideologue and freedom fighter Veer Savarkar's in a Class 10 textbook in the state.

The Goa Board of Secondary and Higher Secondary Education (GBSHSE), however, said the textbook that the NSUI was referring to was discontinued four years back, when books with new content were introduced and pictures were incorporated accordingly.

The National Students'Union of India (NSUI) is the students' wing of the Congress.

The NSUI's Goa unit chief, Ahraz Mulla, told reporters yesterday that the board's social science textbooks of Class 10 has replaced Nehru's picture with that of Savarkar's.

"It is very sad that the board has removed the picture of Pandit Nehru from the textbook. Tomorrow, they will remove the photo of Mahatma Gandhi and question what the Congress has done in 60 years," he said.

GBSHSE chairman Ramakrishna Samant said the book was revised in 2014 based on the inputs given by an expert committee.

"We were using the textbook of NCERT between 2007 and 2014. That textbook was discontinued and replaced by the new one in 2014.

"The earlier book had pictures of Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, Lokmanya Tilak and Bharat Mata," he said.

"But the new version does not have their pictures as the expert committee has taken a decision as per the content," he said.

Samant said the revised book contained pictures of Motilal Nehru and Mahatma Gandhi.

He also wondered why the issue has cropped up now even as the revised book has been part of the curriculum since the last four years and no one had objected to it till yesterday.

"The book was approved by the expert committee and later by the editorial committee, which went through the content before giving its final nod," Samant said.

PTI