Amartya Sen decries `sectarian outlook' to education

By Our Staff Reporter

KOLKATA, JAN. 4. The Nobel-Laureate and Master, Trinity College, Cambridge, Amartya Sen, today denounced the Union Government's reported move to impart religious values as part of primary education. Chances were high that this move would impart a sectarian attitude based on religion, he said.

Addressing the media after a two-day workshop on `Education, Equity and Human Security', co-hosted by the UNICEF, Harvard University, the Commission on Human Security and Pratichi Trust, Prof. Sen said religious self-esteem, in practice, was often misdirected to a sectarian outlook which might bring more harm than good.

On the Centre's move to change the educational content and curriculum, he said ``there is a danger that some political groups may manipulate the educational content and curriculum in schools for subversive purposes. Openness of the curriculum and a secular and inclusive approach that cultivates reasoning and scrutiny can be central to the role of education to promote human security''.

Describing the lack of education and other social infrastructure as a far greater threat to human security than ``terrorism'', he said the number of people who had died of AIDS, malaria or tuberculosis across the world on September 11, would far outstrip the number of casualties in the World Trade Center crash.

On the tension between India and Pakistan, he said it was time the Indian media came out of the clutches of Government propaganda and promoted the existence and the role of the intelligentsia in Pakistan who were no less critical of their own Government.

The Nobel laureate, Amartya Sen, addressing a press conference in Kolkata on Friday.- Photo: Sushanta Patronobish