Minister hits back at Gen Rawat for education revamp remark

Majid Jahangir

Tribune News Service

Srinagar, January 13

A senior minister in the J&K Government today took Army Chief General Bipin Rawat head-on for demanding education revamp and advised the Army to focus on its job.

Minister for Education Altaf Bukhari asked General Rawat not to make “unnecessary comments beyond his constitutional mandate and trespass his defined mandate.”

“Those who have no link with education are talking about it. We have an education system, whatever shortcomings are there, we are trying to address them…,” Bukhari told reporters on the sidelines of a function organised by a school in Srinagar today.

Clearly hinting that he was not happy with the Army Chief’s assertions, Bukhari asked the Army to “concentrate on their job.”

“There is no need for their advice. Those people who are not concerned with education tell us whether there should be one map or two maps in the schools. We are not going to accept this. Let them (Army) do their job. Perhaps they are not doing their job properly because of which we are suffering,” he said.

During a press conference in Delhi on Friday ahead of Army Day, General Rawat reportedly took a hardline approach against the education system in J&K and called for its revamp. He said madrasas and mosques were spreading disinformation.

“India is a democratic country and the Army cannot have control on everything. Perhaps he (General Rawat) knows it and I know it very well. Our students and teachers are efficient. Our students have topped the IAS exams. Aberrations are there in every society. I do not think I will take any sermon from anybody. I have a boss (Chief Minister) and if she finds any fault in the education system, we will do (address) it,” the Education Minister said.

Bukhari claimed children of the state were not going towards radicalisation.

“Our Army is doing good work and they should do their own job,” he said.