Schools will finally get new syllabus

new delhi: as the national council for educational research and training puts the finishing touches to new syllabus for four classes, the textbook publishing industry is getting jittery over the delay in its release. although ncert officials said the syllabi would be out in two to three weeks time, private publishers are counting each day. the council is simultaneously readying to release the syllabi to state education boards.the "extra" time is seemingly being taken to fine-tune the syllabus and weed out possibly controversial material, in view of the rough weather it faced over charges of saffronisation, sources said. the revamped syllabus is for classes i, iii, vi and ix. the syllabus revamping exercise is being undertaken by the ncert after 13 years. although the ncert chooses to ignore it, it too is under deadline pressure to release the syllabi to the various state education boards in order to enable them to bring out new books in time. "ncert's idea is not to clash with private publishers. in fact we encourage the state boards to bring their own books," said director j s rajput. ncert books are prescribed in roughly per cent of the schools, mostly government run. private publishers cite several reasons for their impatience. for one, the school sessions in different states start at different times. "for the majority of the regions where the session starts in april, we have to get our books into the by december," said rohit of vikas publications. when the textbook prescription process in schools takes off. in north-eastern states where the school sessions start in november, publishers are under pressure to bring out books by august. considering the drill that follows, there isn't much time, publishers feel. "the full-scale rewriting activity will have to be achieved by october-end. only then can we meet the december deadline," said a daryaganj based publisher. that's because production and printing takes about two months, dhar said. publishers commission their own writers, usually school teachers, to write the books. publishers believe the new syllabus will contribute to a spurt in the turnover of the textbook publishing industry. "the nationwide turnover has already crossed rs 10,000 crore this year," said dhar. statistics show ncert books form a minor segment, the council sold books worth rs 47.3 in 2001. one of the reasons for the spurt will the dumbing down of the second-hand book market. yet, publishers are envisaging a year of low-profits. "there might be a higher sale of books, but because of the sheer amount of rewriting to be done this year, investment will be greater than the return," a publisher added.