The Hindu Editorial Analysis | 4th September ’20

Table of Contents

Towards inclusive syllabi

Most people say that they found history irrelevant and boring in school.
Others liked it because their teacher was a great storyteller.
But has it helped them in understanding their identity better, or in not repeating mistakes made in the past?
How history can be taught differently is one conversation, and how the content can enable that is another.
CBSE Class 7 textbook : north-south divide is evident.
6/12 chapters are dedicated to Delhi Sultanate and the Mughal empire
Vijayanagara empire: half chapter
The Northeast is ignored in the curriculum.
A chapter on the Ahoms (or Tai-Ahom), and the oral history of other ethnic groups will make us, more educated about an important part of India.
Oral traditions can also open up exciting discussions in the classroom on what historians consider “valid proof” in historical research.
African, South American and Asian traditions have long considered oral traditions valid proofs, whereas the western tradition considers what is in a book more truthful.
CBSE re-examine syllabus
Start with local history and subsequently move to State, national and international histories
Children in Tamil Nadu know nothing of the Pandya dynasty that promoted Tamil.
- It was also one of the longest-ruling dynasties in India, besides the Mughals, Cholas and other famous empires of classical India.
Kerala could have chapters about the Kulasekhara (who had a state-of-the-art observatory).
Andhra Pradesh the Kakatiyas, and so on.
A chapter on cultural history in medieval times, about what people ate, how they dressed, the nuances of irrigation, land cultivation, how they resolved fights and what games they played, would be fascinating for 11 to 12-year-olds.
Perhaps a local history project could be implemented if the region has medieval remains.
Chapter on literature across the States of that time.
Languages have much more than just religious verses — there are dramas, fun poems with onomatopoeia, word puzzles, or entire books where every stanza is a palindrome.
History should help children increase their sense of identity.

Partial relief

The Supreme Court’s decision this week to allow telecom service providers 10 years’ time to settle their adjusted gross revenue (AGR) dues to the government comes as a partial relief to the debt-laden industry.
Centre recommended 20 years period.
Centre had made clear that were the AGR dues to be sought at one go, it could well push a service provider into insolvency proceedings.
The Indian Banks’ Association (IBA) had also explained its position in seeking a judicious and non-disruptive outcome.

Mind the gaps in India’s health care digital push

National Digital Health Mission (NDHM)
‘Going Digital’ has no doubt been a magic phrase
On August 27 we learnt that the Ministry of Health was expecting feedback and public comments on the draft by September 3. Since then the date has been extended by another week.
In fact many States have already achieved some breakthroughs in these areas with the National Rural Health Mission (NRHM) and, subsequently, National Health Mission through the IT network connected to most public health centres even in tribal areas.
Most practitioners, especially specialists without data entry staff, often extract only the relevant notes and return the hard copies.
All larger health facilities generate and store computerised patient data also for planning treatment, procurement of medicines and consumables.
Ironically, many tertiary hospitals and medical colleges care little for diagnostic reports from peripheral centres or even the prescriptions of previous doctors.
An IT consulting firm has been engaged to build a National Health Stack and a registry of over eight lakh doctors, 10 lakh pharmacists and over 60,000 hospitals is under preparation.
At a later stage, online pharmacies, insurance companies and other stakeholders will be added to the ‘Stack’.
Overall, the scheme appears to promise an end-to-end, hands-free Digital experience.
Insurance companies would be looking for multiple ways to reduce their obligations leading to many disputes.
Some larger hospitals have already gone for robust and sophisticated software systems.
Among independent practitioners in allopathic and the Indian systems of medicine who run small dispensaries especially in rural areas, there is no practice of even storing patient data on computers.
Public health practitioners at the grass-root level would continue to wonder if digitisation is the immediate problem facing the health sector or the best way to go about addressing data gaps.

A politics of avoidance that must be questioned

We, the people of India – Constitution – democracy a parliamentary form of government – executive – legislature– periodically elected
Legislature procedures
Lawmaking, controlling the national finances and approving taxation proposals, and having discussions on matters of public interest and concern.
Each of these functions is discharged, daily or periodically, during sittings of the legislature and cover questions, adjournment motion, calling attention, half-an-hour discussion, motion of no confidence, questions of privilege, etc.
Among these instruments of accountability, the daily ‘Question Hour’ has an unmatched criticality on account of its regularity and its availability on a basis of equality to every Member of the House, Rajya Sabha or Lok Sabha.
It has a special significance in the proceedings of Parliament since it covers every aspect of government activity, domestic and foreign.
The government of the day is thus helped to feel the pulse of the nation and give the public a view of the performance of both of its elected representatives and of the Ministers.
Questions are addressed to a specific Minister of the government and can seek oral answers marked by an asterisk or a written one.
The veracity of the answers given are matters of utmost importance and rules permit correction of inaccuracies by the Minister concerned.
Copies of answers given are available to Members at the Notice Office before the start of the day’s proceedings as also on the websites.
To elicit specific information from the government.
Govt can explain its stand.
Forthcoming session of Parliament (monsoon session that starts on September 14) that ‘there will be no Question Hour.’
In this context, the deletion of ‘Question Hour’ from the announced agenda of the day is baffling and has understandingly been viewed as curtailment of the right to question the government.
Subsequent clarifications have stated that the Unstarred Questions will continue to be received and answered and that the change will relate only to Starred Questions and the Supplementary questions emanating from them that require to be answered orally.
The purpose of a Starred Question is to explore the intent and the alleged illegality or procedural lacuna that the government decision in question has sought to camouflage in the form of words and expressions used in the answer.
The Oral Supplementary questions seek to unravel these.
Perhaps greater sensitivity to parliamentary and public sentiments could have been displayed by exploring procedural options that would retain the substance if not the complete form of a Starred Question.
The test of a functioning democracy is its ability to face crises — social, economic, political — and seek correctives premised on institutions of democracy.
A resort to what has been called ‘the politics of avoidance’ does not help the process.
Executive accountability upfront cannot be allowed to become a thing of the past.

NEWS

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Sports training camps in Uttar Pradesh to start from 1st October.