C for cow, R for Ram, U for Uma

C for cow, R for Ram, U for Uma...- The Times of India: "A for Arjun , B for Brahma , C for Cow, D for Dhruva , G for Ganesh , H for Hanuman ...J for Jambavant ..M for Mahadev ...R for Ram ...T for Temple, U for Uma . Aaj Somwar Hai, Shivji ka var hai; sache man se bhajan karenge, sabka bera par hai; aaj mangalwar hai, hanumanji ka var hai....

If you missed this 'Hindi-Hindu-Hindustan' version of an English primer and school prayer, head for any of the thousands of VHP-run Ekal Vidyalayas (EV) in BJP-ruled Jharkhand. Sorry, the letters 'E', 'F', 'Q', 'W', 'X' and 'Z' don't exist in the primer, but since there aren't any names of Hindu gods beginning with those letters, they're probably not worth bothering about anyway.

Being run for the past many years by Friends of Tribal Society and other front organisations of the Sangh from a direct grant by the union HRD ministry, the communal curriculum and content of these schools have come to light in a report by a four-member inquiry committee of the HRD ministry.

The above illustrations are only a glimpse of how the HRD ministry under M M Joshi carried out a systematic programme to Hinduise primary education, particularly in states like Jharkhand where Christian missionaries have been working among tribals for long.

The report, submitted by Avdesh Kaushal, Dipak Malik, P Sudhir Kumar and K R Meena, also shows how the EVs were being used to siphon off funds obtained as grants.

The Ekal Vidyalayas were siphoning off funds from the HRD ministry in the guise of providing non-formal education and learning material to village children.

Further, a base book ( Khele, Kude, Nache, Gaye ) for training teachers of EVs was written by one Rakesh Popli who was also a member of the grants-in-aid committee of the HRD ministry that decided which NGOs would be given funds for running these schools.

Popli's version of Birsa Munda's life would definitely be an eye-opener to subaltern historians. He writes: "Birsa studied in a missionary school; converted to Christianity; was made to eat beef and forced to cut his tuft in hostel; returned home upset; began worshipping tulsi, wore sacred thread; roamed in forests; struggled against missionaries, landlords and British government...arrested, slowly poisoned in jail." Popli's book also contains a series of rhymes on cow, Ram-Sita and other Gods of Hindu pantheon.

Not all teachers of EVs were content with merely propagating communal education. For instance, during their visit to a EV in Jharkhand's Tantnagar block of Singhbhum district, the inquiry team was told by a teacher (Manney Singh Kandiyan) of "how he, with his other colleagues, destroyed the half-built church in 2002". Kandiyan also told the inquiry team that charges against him were dropped at the behest of the ruling party. "