NEP based on teachings of visionaries like Mahatma Gandhi: Amit Shah

Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Thursday hailed the central government's New Education Policy for its emphasis on learning in mother tongue and universal education based on the teachings of Indian visionaries such as Mahatma Gandhi and Dayanand Saraswati.

Addressing the 113th convocation of the Gurukula Kangri here, Shah credited the university (deemed to be) for the revival of vedic education in India and combining it with modern education.

Shah paid tributes to the university's founder Swami Shraddhanand saying he set India's education system free from the stranglehold of the British and revived the country's vedic education system, all the while emphasising on culture and modern education.

Shah praised the NEP brought by the Narendra Modi-led central government saying it represents the combined visions of Maharshi Dayanand Saraswati, Swami Shraddhanand, Mahatma Gandhi, and Lala Lajpat Rai.

"The new education policy, which is the country's third, contains the visions of four great people. Accessible education as propagated by Maharshi Dayanand, combining vedic education with modern as propagated by Swami Shraddhanand, Mahatma Gandhi's education in mother tongue, and Lala Lajpat Rai's principle of education for all are at the core of this policy," Shah said.

Education in engineering courses has begun to be imparted in the mother tongues of 10 states, while people appearing in JEE, NIIT, and IAS exams have the option of taking the tests in their own mother tongues, he said.

The NEP makes education streamless and classless, with no barriers to science and arts streams, and freedom to learn anything in accordance with one's interest and aptitude, he said.

He said Prime Minister Modi has brought international glory to India and Indianness.

"Narendra Modi readily took decisions which the country was not able to take for decades. Be it abolition of article 370 or securing the boundaries of the country through such measures as surgical strikes or making the country jump from the world's 11th to the 5th largest economy in the world, the Prime Minister has done everything to make the country proud," Shah said.

Congratulating the 1,800 students conferred with degrees at the convocation, he said they should be proud of having studied in a great institution such as the Gurukula Kangri University, and urged them to apply their learning in nation building so that it emerges as the world's leading country in its 100th year.