By Pavneet Singh Chadha / The Indian Express
Last week, a group of class 11 students from a private school in Goa were taken for a workshop at a mosque in the port city of Mormugao. Since then, the school has been at the centre of a storm, with the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) demanding an ED probe into the school management’s finances, the management suspending the principal, and several students protesting against the principal’s suspension.
According to sources, the state Education Department has moved a proposal to initiate action against the school management for sending students for the workshop and to look into the allegations raised by the VHP.
Members of the VHP had barged into the Keshav Smruti Higher Secondary School in Alto Dabolim last Monday (September 11), two days after the workshop, and held a protest. They accused the school principal of “supporting anti-national activities” and claimed that the workshop was part of a conspiracy to “brainwash young children and an attempt to carry out religious conversions”.
The principal, Shankar Gaonkar, denied the allegations and said that the school had been organising visits to temples, churches and mosques for years in order to promote communal harmony.
However, VHP’s South Goa joint secretary Sanjiv Korgaonkar alleged that the school principal had not informed the students’ parents about the workshop.
“Some photos of school children performing rituals at the mosque and wearing hijab have been circulating on social media. We took up the matter with the school authorities. It has also been learnt that the students of a government school in Baina had attended the workshop. This programme was not part of the curriculum and no approvals had been taken from the Education Department,” he said.
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