RSS Recommends 12-Hour Schools, No Co-Education
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The RSS proposal, submitted to the Human and Resource Development Ministry, also points out that co-education will have to be discontinued if working hours of schools are extended.
It has also emphasised that the new policy should stress on “Indianisation of Education,” The Indian Express reported.
The right wing outfit has now suggested that schools in metropolises work 12 hours a day (7.30 AM – 7.30 PM) to enable children learn more languages, apart from relieving "their (working) parents from the task of making children do homework... or (the) need for (sending) them to tuitions," according to the IE report.
The RSS and other right-wing organisations, collectively called the Sangh Parivar, have grown more vocal about policy matters after the Narendra Modi-led BJP government came to power at the Centre in May 2014.
The ruling party and its ideological partners have been accused by the opposition of trying to "saffronise" the education system.
Earlier in the month, Vidya Bharati Akhil Bharatiya Shikshan Sansthan, an affiliate body of the RSS, said it wanted to set up a model school in every block in the country. Formed in 1977, the Sansthan now runs 12,364 schools and 49 colleges across the country.
Emphasising the importance of learning all languages including English, the RSS in its proposal also made a case for students learning Sanskrit from mid-school onwards, saying it will help them speak and write their mother tongues perfectly without "the assistance of foreign words."
It also reasoned that learning Sanskrit will help improve the children’s pronunciation and spelling skills.
“It’s easy for children to learn languages in childhood. That’s why they should be taught various languages — their mother tongue, Sanskrit, Hindi, English and regional languages,” said the Express report, quoting from the proposal.
The RSS also argued that extending school hours would give students time to extra-curricular activities.
The Hindutva group has also advocated improvements in teachers’ training by introducing a minimum 50%-mark threshold for all aspirants who will then be selected through an entrance exam.
Other suggestions included biometric attendance system and CCTV cameras in classrooms.
