New Delhi, July 7: In a bid to reduce its syllabus in view of the COVID-19 situation, the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) on Tuesday dropped chapters on religion and caste, democracy, federalism, citizenship, nationalism, secularism and demonetisation from the curriculum for classes 9 to 12 for the academic year 2020-21. The board has rationalised by up to 30 per cent the syllabus for classes 9 to 12 for the academic year 2020-21.

The CBSE dropped chapters such as democracy and diversity, gender, religion and caste, popular struggles and movement, challenges to democracy from the curriculum of class 10. For class 11, the deleted portions included chapters on federalism, citizenship, nationalism, secularism, growth of local governments in India. Similarly, chapters on India’s relations with its neighbours, changing nature of India’s economic development, social movements in India and demonetisation have been removed from class 10 syllabus. ICSE, ISC Syllabus Reduced By 25% For Academic Year 2020-21 Due To COVID-19: CISCE.

The curriculum has been rationalised while retaining the core elements, the Ministry of Human Resource Development said. "Considering the importance of learning achievement, it has been decided to rationalize syllabus up to 30 per cent by retaining the core concepts," HRD minister Ramesh Pokhriyal wrote in a tweet. "Looking at the extraordinary situation prevailing in the country and the world, #CBSE was advised to revise the curriculum and reduce course load for the students of Class 9th to 12th," he added.

For classes 1 to 8, the National Council of Education Research and Training (NCERT) has already notified an alternative calendar and learning outcomes. Universities and schools across the country have been closed since March 16 when the central government announced a nationwide classroom shutdown as one of the measures to contain the COVID-19 outbreak.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Jul 07, 2020 11:49 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).