Guwahati: The Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) on Tuesday removed some key chapters from the syllabus for students of classes 9-12 for the academic year 2020-21. The HRD Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal Nishank tweeted, "Considering the importance of learning achievement, it has been decided to rationalize syllabus upto 30% retaining core concepts."
Major changes have been made in the syllabus of Economics and Political Science for classes 9-12. The most striking revision has been from the class 11 Political Science syllabus, where significant chapters like Federalism, Citizenship, Nationalism and Secularism have been completely removed. Also, two units from the chapter 'Local government' - 'Why do we need Local Governments' and 'Growth of Local Governments in India', have also been omitted.
For the students of class 12, the board has deleted 'Security in the Contemporary World', 'Environment and Natural Resources', 'Social and New Social Movements in India', and 'Regional Aspirations'. From the 'Planned Development' chapter, units dealing with the 'Changing nature of India's economic development' and 'Planning Commission and Five Year Plans' have been removed. Another important topic diluted is India's foreign policy. From this unit, 'India's relationship with its neighbours: Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, Sri Lanka, and Myanmar' has been deleted for the present session.
From the class 9 Political Science syllabus, chapters on Democratic Rights and Structure of the Indian Constitution have been removed. In Economics, a chapter on 'Food Security in India' has also been completely removed.
For the students of class 10, chapters on "Democracy and Diversity", "Caste, Religion and Gender", and "Challenges to Democracy" have been removed. Despite CBSE's arguments claiming that the move was indented to reduce the burden of the students, it received flak from a section of disappointed social media users concerned that the ommission of these chapters could hamper the quality of education imparted to students.