GOA, India — Villagers in India’s Goa region have begun their battle against a Hindu extremist takeover of primary education.
When schools reopened June 6 after the summer vacation, the villagers organized to form the Committee for the Protection of Government Primary Schools (CPGPS). Their goal was to hinder new pro-Hindu organizations from taking over their schools that formerly belonged to the government.
The government had recently decided to privatize 52 primary schools in rural areas of Goa under the pretext of a declining student rate. It decided to hand them over to unregistered organizations that sources allege have been started and financed by Hindu fundamentalist organizations.
More than 35 percent of Goa’s 1.5 million inhabitants are Christian. The church has been the pioneer of primary and secondary education for centuries in this tiny state of southwestern India. Goa’s performance in education is reported to be the best in the country.
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