Belagavi, DHNS: Textbook revision panel to submit report next month. Minister for Primary and Secondary Education Tanveer Sait on Friday said the existing syllabus would be continued in primary and high schools of the state board during the academic year 2017-18.

Responding to questions raised by Arun Shahapur and Somanna Bevinamarad (both BJP) in the Legislative Council, Sait said that the Centre is in the process of implementing the new education policy. It is also not advisable to change the syllabus at a time when the National Curriculum Framework (NCF-2012) is being implemented, he added.

Earlier, Shahapur questioned the functioning of the committee headed by Prof Baragur Ramachandrappa, which had been formed a couple of years ago to suggest changes to the syllabus for Classes 1 to 10. He said the committee has not even submitted its interim report to the government.

Sait said the revision of the syllabus is in the final stages, and the committee would submit its report in the second week of December. The present syllabus is being revised to enable students to be better prepared to take up the Common Entrance Test and the National Eligibility Cum Entrance Test.

The minister also clarified that the government is not shutting down schools despite shortage of students. Higher Education Minister Basavaraj Rayaraddy told the Council that a meeting will be convened in Bengaluru to discuss the provision of notional pay to teachers and lecturers of grant-in-aid schools and colleges, after the conclusion of the ongoing legislature session. Earlier, V S Sankanur (BJP) criticised the government for the delay in paying notional pay to teachers. Not satisfied with the government’s reply, the Opposition members staged a dharna. They also opposed the government’s decision not to withdraw the writ appeal filed in court, challenging the quashing of the Karnataka Educational Institutions Employees (Regulation of Pay, Pension and other Benefits) Act, 2014, which had gone in favour of the Karnataka private educational institutions employees.

Conditional assentRayareddy said the government had given a conditional assent to implementing notional pay, if the financial burden on the government did not exceed Rs 285 crore. However, the financial burden on the exchequer would be Rs 5,081 crore.