A member of the expert panel that assisted the S.K. Thorat Committee in reviewing cartoons in the political science textbooks of Classes X and XII has described the report as ‘illegitimate’ and prepared by an ‘ill-conceived committee busy in public grandstanding.’
Rejecting the report on “professional grounds,” Arun K. Patnaik, Professor of Political Science, University of Hyderabad, who was one of the 13 experts asked to review the textbooks, has said he “has serious doubts regarding a committee report prepared by people who are no experts in the discipline of political science.”
The recommendations of the experts haven’t been incorporated in the final report, and neither do they figure in the annexure, as they had reportedly been given to understand.
In a strongly-worded e-mail written to Professor Thorat, chairperson of the committee, Professor Patnaik, said: “The Thorat Committee, in my view, doesn’t have expertise in political science subjects. There is only one political science person in the committee. In my view, the committee should have gone by the expert opinions rather than its own opinion.
“Professional ethics demand that the committee members should have refrained from commenting on National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT) textbooks prepared by political scientists. I have serious doubts regarding a committee report prepared by people who are no experts in the discipline of political science.”
If we don’t question the report on these grounds, Professor Patnaik said in the e-mail, then nobody from the committee or outside has any moral right to criticise parliamentarians for commenting on subject matters of social sciences without any expertise.
“I reject the double standards being followed by the protagonists or even by critics of the report,” Professor Patnaik said.
According to him, the committee claims that it consulted the experts on the subject, but has ignored the recommendations.
“I was a member of the expert committee whose report was placed before the committee. But the final committee ignored my report on Class X and XII school textbooks. I hope the rest of the subject experts would “wake up” before it is too late for the profession of political science or political scientists.
“Unlike me, they haven’t circulated their report to everybody else. I don’t know what their respective positions are, to be able to comment on the nature of the recommendations ignored by the Thorat Committee,” he said.
While Professor Thorat had indicated that the recommendations would be incorporated in the final report, or at least attached as annexure, these find only a cursory mention.
“The opinion expressed by the experts was used as resource material to arrive at the final view of the committee,” the final document said.
The six-member Thorat Committee had asked 13 subject experts to go through the relevant textbooks and give their views.
This was in addition to members of the National Monitoring Committee and two Chief Advisers — Professor Yogendra Yadav and Suhas Palshikar — who had stepped down following the controversy in May this year.
The committee particularly sought the opinion of two experts who had some experience on the use of cartoons in teaching at the school level.
