A report by a panel of scholars appointed by the new HRD ministry in their efforts to de-saffronise Indian education, has indicated that saffronisation of the history texts used in schools was a minor matter as compared to the ‘Northanization’ of Indian history by parochial writers with ‘a strong north-India bias’.

Evidence: Of the 89 pages devoted to the study of Ancient History of India, not even nine full pages are spared for the history of peninsular India. ??Tamil Nadu and Karnataka together have preserved a corpus of over 50,000 inscriptions, but not even a passing reference is made to this enviable wealth, even where the sources of history are discussed.??

The panel contrasts this with the reality: An estimated 1,050 CBSE schools teach this course (and follow this text) in the four states of South India and two union territories (Kerala: 489, Andhra Pradesh: 350, Tamilnadu : 150, Karnataka: 35; Lakshadweep: 10 and Andaman: 15).

??To all these students, the text has nothing to offer about the land in which they are born and brought up, and also in which the majority of them spend the rest of their lives. As long as history is imposed from above, in this manner, without involving the scholarship of the rest of the country, the history of India is bound to be a meaningless exercise.??

The report also does criticize the exclusion of certain facts relating to Muslim movements in the Indian history, pointing to ’saffronisation’ of the books. But the major emphasis is on the ‘north-Indian’ bias that was introduced in the books by the previous government.

The UPA government has finally taken the decision to scrap POTA by repealing it during the monsoon session of the parliament. But some of the provisions of this ‘draconian’ Act will be retained by adding them to already existing laws of the land.

This decision, while in keeping with the promises made in the Common Minimum Programme, is purely symbolic since the POTA was, in any case, going to lapse on October 24, 2004.

Some say the job market is opening up fast in the US. Some say its booming. So you think about posting resumes to US job consultants with the hopes of snagging a job or two in the land of opportunity. Well thats what a lot of my friends have been doing these days.

But then if you read The Economic Times (and horror of horrors, believe it), you’d be worried to death about going to the US for a techie job!!

A story at the start of this month says its a tough call for geeks to either relocate or quit! A few days later… another story appears… which paints a bleak picture of what happens when even IT pros lose their jobs. Almost immediately after this, the focus shifts to the Techies’ parents, who are described as being a lonely lot by our friendly neighbourhood financial newspaper (or salmon pink coloured dishrag, but I repeat myself!). Perhaps that is why it reports that Indian techie eves are on their way home. And perhaps due to the combined effects of an exodus of Indian women techies (who, the financial toilet-paper claims, are not driven by any fanatical desire to be Silicon Valley residents) and arrival of pink slips in the DINK households, marriages of Indian pros are breaking up! Ohh the woe!!

And now even the US techies managing the Indian IT pros are beginning to grumble. They grumble about about everything that has to do with Indians… the time-management, fake accents, clannish attitudes, easily amused nature and even the gold belt buckles!! Frankly speaking… this article does nothing to project the clannish attitudes that Indians harbour while abroad. Rather it comes across as a conversation between a group of bitchy Yanks! The article ends with a revelatory statement… “(This is a true transcript of a conversation)”. Well… I’ll eat my hat if it was a real-life conversation!!

One notable feature about these articles is that they all been authored by the same person, a certain Lopamudra Ghatak. Either this author is a crusader of some sort or there is some sort of a hidden agenda behind such a string of articles within the space of two weeks! … Or maybe I’m just a conspiracy theorist!!