Stories
Farmers Call 12-Hour Odisha Bandh Over School Textbook Errors, Demand Minister's Resignation
- •The Naba Nirman Krushak Sangathan (NNKS) has called a 12-hour Odisha bandh on Wednesday.
- •The bandh demands the resignation of School and Mass Education Minister Nityananda Gond over alleged large-scale errors in government school textbooks.
- •NNKS national coordinator Akshay Kumar, on hunger strike since September 6, sought public support for the agitation, emphasizing its link to students' future and Odisha's pride.
- •The organization cited over 1,700 errors, including misidentifying Niyamgiri Hills and Isaac Newton, and using a picture of the Karnataka assembly instead of Odisha's.
- •Police have made elaborate security arrangements in Bhubaneswar, deploying forces to maintain law and order during the bandh.
Key Questions Answered
The Naba Nirman Krushak Sangathan (NNKS) called a 12-hour Odisha bandh to demand the resignation of School and Mass Education Minister Nityananda Gond following large-scale errors discovered in government school textbooks. The outfit reported over 1,700 errors, such as misidentifying the Niyamgiri Hills location, placing a Karnataka assembly picture instead of Odisha's, and describing scientist Isaac Newton as a pilot.
The newly published textbooks contained over 1,700 errors, including a reference stating that the Niyamgiri Hills are located in Jharkhand and the inclusion of a picture of the Karnataka assembly instead of the Odisha assembly. Additionally, scientist Isaac Newton was described as a pilot in the textbooks, and state data revealed thousands of grammatical, typological, spelling, and conceptual mistakes across classes 1 to 8.
The 12-hour bandh called by the Naba Nirman Krushak Sangathan received support from the CPI(M) and the Republican Party of India. Meanwhile, the Congress and other INDIA bloc parties chose not to join it, opting instead to announce a separate state-wide bandh on October 8 over issues including the repeal of the new mining law, the removal of the Chief Election Commissioner, and the resignation of Minister Nityananda Gond.
