MoI committee should be up by July 29: FORCE

MoI committee should be up by July 29: FORCE July 23, 2013 TEAM HERALD PANJIM: Days after its meeting in south Goa, the Forum for Rights to Children’s Education (FORCE) has served an ultimatum to the Goa government to constitute its academic committee by July 29 and come out with a permanent solution to the medium of instruction (MoI) issue by September 30. The parents body in north Goa has taken the movement forward by demanding a solution to the MoI issue by setting deadlines before the government, and argued that it should be done in a transparent manner. The FORCE held a meeting in Panjim of executive members of PTA (parent teacher associations) of north Goa schools and appraised the gathering of its meeting held last week in south Goa. FORCE was entrusted with the responsibility of ensuring that the government constitutes its academic committee with knowledgeable people and not political appointees. It has also demanded that the committee should have at least three representatives of FORCE and members from the Archdiocesan Board of Education (ABE). “All we are asking the chief minister is to keep to his latest assurance of forming the academic committee within a week and to come out with a solution within two months,” Savio Lopes, secretary of FORCE said. Lopes said that a year has lapsed since the government promised a permanent solution to the MoI tangle and the demand is to get the matter resolved at the earliest. The gathering of parents who represented executive committees of PTAs of schools in north Goa have also insisted that FORCE scrutinise the committee appointed by the government. Monday’s meeting came down heavily on the Goa government for targeting aided schools and English as the medium of instruction. The forum insisted that parents and children have a right to choose their medium of instruction. “The Constitution gives every Indian the right to free and compulsory education and right to speech and expression,” The Secretary of the Diocesan Society of Education (DSE) Fr Zeferino D’Souza said adding, “We must ensure that we also get grants which are our due and not allow the government to divide and destroy us.” Fr D’Souza added that mother tongue does not exclude English language. He insisted that the government should amend the Act and rules as required to give a permanent solution to the long drawn battle over MoI so that no changes are made with change in governments. During the meeting the government was ridiculed for its hypocrisy on the MoI issue and targeting aided schools while on the other hand it was appointing B.Ed English teachers numbering 300 for its government schools. Earlier Lopes said that FORCE has been tirelessly working to get the MoI issue resolved. “But the government is keeping the MoI issue alive to help private schools. We are here now to tell the government that our patience is over,” he said. http://www.heraldgoa.in/News/Main%20Page%20News/MoI-committee-should-be-up-by-July-29-FORCE/77283.html