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Recently, the Union government gave its approval to Baba Ramdev’s Patanjali Yogpeeth Trust to set up the Bharatiya Shiksha Board (BSB) even though MSRVVP objected to it.
About Bharatiya Shiksha Board (BSB)
- The idea to establish a new national school board for “swadeshikaran (indigenisation)” of education was first mooted by Ramdev.
- In 2015, the yoga guru, through his Haridwar-based Vedic Education Research Institute (VERI), submitted a proposal to the Centre.
- He proposed to start a school board to help Indianise education by offering a mix of “archaistic education of Maharshi Dayanand”, “human education of Aurobindo”, “vedanta education of Swami Vivekananda” and modern curriculum.
- In 2019, the Union government overruled objections from MSRVVP and approved the bid by Baba Ramdev’s Patanjali Yogpeeth Trust to set up the BSB.
- Since the approval on March 9, 2019, BSB has been registered as a society and set up an office in Haridwar.
- A sum of Rs 71 crore as corpus fund and development fund has been deposited in its bank account and the Executive Board of BSB has also been constituted of which Ramdev is the chairman.
- BSB, a national school board on Vedic education will be set up on the lines of CBSE.
- BSB was conceived to be the country’s first national school board that would standardise “Indian traditional knowledge” and “blend it with modern education” by way of drafting curriculum, affiliating schools, conducting examinations and issuing certificates.
- The BSB is likely to affiliate Ramdev’s Acharyakulam; Vidya Bharati schools (run by the RSS); and gurukuls run by the Arya Samaj because it will allow them to sustain their model of education up to Class XII.
Timeline: Objections by Maharshi Sandipani Rashtriya Veda Vidya Pratishthan (MSRVVP)
- After Baba Ramdev’s proposal, the then school education secretary S C Khuntia red-flagged the proposal on the grounds that the state’s sanction for a private board would open the doors for similar requests from other unrecognised school boards.
- In 2019, at a meeting of its Governing Council, chaired by Javadekar, MSRVVP tabled an agenda item (No. 3A) proposing to set up its own Vedic Education Board.
- But digressing from the original agenda item, the Governing Council decided that a Bharatiya Shiksha Board (BSB) for blending Vedic with modern education be set up through open bidding.
- And it was asked to appoint a private sponsoring body for putting BSB in place.
- Baba Ramdev’s Patanjali Yogpeeth Trust got the successful bid to set up BSB.
Maharshi Sandipani Rashtriya Veda Vidya Pratishthan (MSRVVP)
- It is an autonomous organisation under the Education Ministry, working on encouraging and preserving “Ved Vidya”.
- It also works for the preservation, conservation and development of Vedic Studies by establishing and supporting Ved Pathshalas.
- It is named after Sandipani, guru of lord Krishna.
- It was established in 1987 at Delhi and was moved to Ujjain in Madhya Pradesh in 1993.
Source: Indian Express
