New Delhi: The Supreme Court was on Thursday moved for a direction to stop the distribution of textbooks published by the National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT) for classes XI and XII containing several "offending" phrases against the Hindu religion, Jats and the Scheduled Castes.

The petition by the Shiksha Bachao Andolan Samiti, the Delhi Pradesh Citizens Council and Bijender Singh Lather said that they were filing the petition to ensure that value-based education did not remain confined to reports of committees and commissions and was actually brought into effect.

They alleged that they had come across certain phrases in Class XI Hindi textbook that hurt the sentiments of the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes. Similarly, there was a reference that hurt the Hindus. In Class XII history textbook, certain "derogatory" references were made against Jats. It was also noticed that unwarranted and factually incorrect statements had been made without any justification.

The Samiti said that it made several representations to the NCERT for the removal of offending words but with no result.

The phrases violated the fabric of secularism, the basic structure of the Constitution. The "derogatory" words used against SC/ST communities were unconstitutional and in violation of the Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989.

They said the Centre and the NCERT had an obligation to impart value education to the new generation and to act for harmony but the writers had given the go-by to the recommendations of the various committees and commissions.

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