MUMBAI, Jan 6: Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee on Monday defended a government decision to implement a new school curriculum, which opposition parties have criticized as ideologically biased.

“The attempt is to correct history as it is being currently taught. All these years students were taught incorrect history by the opposition,” Vajpayee said.

The changes to the school syllabus raised angry protests from opposition groups and some educators, who said parts of Indian history that were opposed to the “religious sentiments” of some groups had been deleted.

They likened the new curriculum to the Taliban’s approach to Islam.

India’s human resources development ministry, headed by hardline nationalist Murli Manohar Joshi, had told schools to take out sections about eating beef, caste discrimination and Hindu gods.

Vajpayee said the BJP-led government had no “vested interests” in making the changes.

“Certain mistakes have also been made in the past during our freedom struggle and that has to be put across the students in the right manner,” he said.

One of the passages the government removed claimed archeological evidence cast doubt on the existence of the Hindu gods Ram and Krishna.

Another section said that in ancient India, beef was served as a mark of honour to special guests and in later centuries high-caste Hindu priests were forbidden to eat beef.

It also said cattle in India were almost wiped out 2,500 years ago because they were killed by Hindus in religious sacrifices.—AFP