Team Herald
PANJIM: The Goa government is in a tight spot following differences between Forum for Rights of Children to Education (FORCE) and Bharatiya Bhasha Suraksha Manch (BBSM) over the decision to give grants to English medium primary schools.
A day after FORCE withdrew its chain hunger strike after some MLAs assured to raise its demand to translate the year-long Cabinet decision into an Act in the coming Assembly session, BBSM threatened to hit the streets if government does not withdraw its Cabinet decision.
Addressing the media on Tuesday, BBSM member Subhash Velingkar condemned FORCE’s act of pressurizing the government and demanded that the legislators supporting FORCE’s demand to step down.
“How can they (legislators) get the right to give a written assurance to raise FORCE’s demand before the Assembly? We condemn the step taken by FORCE and ask these MLAs to resign,” he said.
BBSM has reiterated that the government stop giving grants to English medium primary schools from the next academic year and has decided to launch a massive rally on August 7, from Mahalaxmi Temple to Azad Maidan where it will culminate in a meeting to decide its further course of action.
FORCE organizing secretary Savio Lopes broke his indefinite hunger strike on Monday following an assurance by 11 MLAs that the Medium of Instruction policy would be brought in the form of a Bill in the next Assembly session. A large number of parents who were on a chain hunger strike in support of the demand too ended the strike.
