Deputy Chief Minister of Delhi, Manish Sisodia had announced the government's decision to reduce 25 per cent syllabus for classes 6 to 8 from October.
The Aam Aadmi Party government's decision to reduce 25 per cent syllabus for classes 6 to 8 in Delhi will not cause any loss of learning to students, as skill based subjects will be incorporated and efforts will be made to "reuse" the deleted portions in a more constructive way, said government officials.
"There is not going to be any loss of learning for students if the syllabus is going to be sacrificed for co-curricular activities like music, arts and theatre... Whatever portions will be deleted from the syllabus, are likely to be incorporated in "some form or the other" in the higher grades," said a senior official from the Directorate of Education.
The decision to reduce the syllabus has been criticized by some activists and academicians, who have termed the process to be arbitrary, but the Education department has defended the move.
"This reshuffling and reduction of the syllabus is indispensable because we realised that half of the students can't even read and write properly. Class 6 students do not know basic mathematics. So we are deleting some portions of the syllabus to make space for basic skills programme," said the official.
Earlier this month, Deputy Chief Minister, Manish Sisodia announced the government's decision to reduce 25 per cent syllabus for classes 6 to 8 from October onwards to pave way for more skill-based courses, art, theatre and sports in its education system.
Mr Sisodia, who is also the Education Minister, had said that the government is in talks with CBSE to see how a similar reduction can be worked out for the syllabus for classes 9 to 12 from next year.