CM orders probe after Pak girl drawing her national flag features in Bihar notebooks

Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar has ordered a probe after a picture of a Pakistani girl drawing her country's national flag was printed in school notebooks published by Jamui district administration.

The District Water and Sanitation Committee (DWSC) had published 5,000 notebooks intended to promote 'Swachh Jamui, Swasthya Jamui' campaign in December last year, district administration sources said, adding they were printed by a Patna-based firm.

Some notebooks were distributed among students of government schools but the undistributed copies were recalled after the matter came to light, the sources said.

An official release said the chief minister ordered a probe into how the girl's picture was printed in the school notebooks.

He yesterday directed Jamui District Magistrate Dharmendra Kumar to investigate the matter.

The DM said a four-member committee comprising him, the deputy development commissioner, the district rural development agency director and the district education officer was formed to probe the matter.

The DM said he had asked all the 10 members of DWSC, responsible for devising ways and means to promote such government campaigns, to submit their explanation in writing as to why the picture was used.

The owner of the firm, that printed the notebooks, was also asked to explain the same, he added.

An inside page of the notebook showed the picture of the girl who appears to be about five-years-old, wearing a blue kurta and white dupatta. She is drawing Pakistan's national flag, but one has to look very closely to identify the flag as that of Pakistan, official sources said.

The girl in the picture, the sources said, was the UNICEF's brand ambassador in Pakistan for promoting girl education campaigns.