ICC Note:

Christian schools in India have expressed their concern over the implementation of the National Education Policy (NEP) of 2016. According to the Christians, the NEP will require all students, regardless of religious identity, to practice yoga and study Sanskrit. Both yoga and Sanskrit have deep roots in Hinduism and for Christians in India, being forced to practice these subjects is akin to being forced to practice the Hindu religion in school.  

10/05/2016 India (Free Press Journal) – As many as 150 catholic schools of the city and 565 of the state, part of the Catholic Association for Education have united to raise their voice against the National Education Policy (NEP) 2016.

“We are expressing our fears through a memorandum. The policy makes yoga compulsory and seeks to promote Sanskrit. While we do teach yoga in our schools, we don’t want it to be made compulsory. Same is the case with promoting Sanskrit. All this seems there is an attempt to communalize education,” said the principal of a city catholic school, who did not want to be named.

She added, “If the policy is implemented, the government will have the power to transfer teachers from even private schools between states, the way bank employees are transferred. It will also have control over recruiting teachers, this way where will our autonomy as educational institutions be,” she asked.

We do not want a national curriculum for the subjects of Maths, Science and English as the NEP has proposed, pointing that the quality of education may suffer. “Every board has its own level of difficulty, we don’t want a common curriculum,” she said.

…