Cong., NSF oppose Center’s decision for no holiday on Christmas

Kohima:Hitting out against the Central Govern-ment’s decision by making the December 25 as a working day, the Naga-land Pradesh Congress Commit-tee on Wednesday said ‘it was a direct attack on the secular fabric of the Indian Constitution’.
In a release here, the NPCC said in lieu of the directives from the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) to observe Christmas day as Good Governance Day, the Human Resource Depart-ment Ministry issued a circular on all educational institutions to organise academic programme on a day which was an auspi-cious day for Christians.
It said the directive has ‘once again exposed the true communal credentials of the BJP Government that is at the mercy of the RSS and its affiliates of religious extremists.’
The NPCC said the BJP-RSS combine, by heating up ‘communal temperatures across the country’ has only exposed ‘intolerance for religious minorities’ who have begun to feel ‘insecure and unwanted.’
It also appealed to all citizens to condemn the ‘religious sacrilege under-taken by the BJP-RSS combine’ which it said, was no different from the ‘Tali-ban regime’ that has the potential of setting the country on the ‘path of destruction, much to the delight of our neighbouring adversaries’.
Expressing ‘shock and disappointment’ at the cen-tre’s circular, Naga Students Federation (NSF) president Tongpang Ozukum and general secretary Esther Rhakho said in a statement that the HRD Ministry’s directive would affect Central Government-run Navodaya Schools in the state, which are affiliated to CBSE that operate in almost all rural areas.
The NSF said the circular directed all central institutions to organise essay competition on December 24 and 25.
The federation pointed out that just because former prime minister of India Atal Behari Vajpayee was born on December 25, the BJP-led government ‘should not try to overshadow birth of Jesus Christ by forcing Christians to work on the sacred day-Christmas day’.
The HRD ministry’s circular was ‘an insult to the entire Christian community worldwide’, the NSF added.
The NSF also said the circular might seem simple for many people but cautioned that ‘the sinister intention behind this declaration could be dangerous and counter-productive’ as it was based ‘on religious lines’. (UNI)