CPI(M) and Congress are in a coalition in West Bengal, although they are sparring in Kerala over the ‘act of omission’ in textbooks in schools of another left-ruled state, Tripura.

The leader of opposition in Kerala state legislative assembly, Ramesh Chennithala wrote a letter to Communist Party of India (Marxist) general secretary, Sitaram Yechury referring the issue of taking out chapters on Mahatma Gandhi and removing the history of Independent movement from the textbooks of Tripura State Education Board. He said, “lessons about Mahatma Gandhi and the history of Independence movement were removed from the textbook of Tripura State Education Board.”

In his letter to Yechury the Congress leader said that Education board of Tripura has removed the part that describes Gandhi and his contributions to India’s freedom movement. “This is a very dangerous trend that the CPI(M)-led government has set in motion in Tripura and it needs urgent correction. It is all the more unfortunate that (the) Tripura government’s action comes close on the heels of the lessons related to Jawaharlal Nehru (that) has been dropped arbitrarily in Rajasthan,” The Congress leader said.

“Also, it has altogether removed the history of India’s freedom movement from the state’s Class 9 history textbooks. The only national icon that figures in the Class 9 textbook is Mahatma Gandhi, but not for his contributions to India’s freedom movement but for his views on cricket. The book features Russian and French revolutions. It also devotes pages to the birth of cricket in England and IPL, Nazism and the rise of Adolf Hitler,” he further wrote in the letter.

He has alleged that as the BJP is trying to saffronise the text books of history on national level, the Left is doing the same on state level, “In national level BJP is trying to saffronise text book and history. At the same time unfortunately Left front government in Tripura is also on the same path by removing the portions regarding national leaders like Gandhiji. On one hand the BJP is trying to saffronise the textbook, on the other hand your government is trying to erase the history of our national icons and trying to paint red.”

By Prajakt K.