2 NCERT advisors resign after Ambedkar caroon row

Yogendra Yadav and Suhas Palshikar on Friday resigned as advisors of NCERT text book council in the wake of the row over the cartoon of B R Ambedkar in school text books.

"Yogendra Yadav, who was the chief advisor of the Textbook Development Committee, and Suhas Palshikar who was the member of the committee have resigned," sources in the human resource development ministry said.

Palshikar said he has quit the advisor council in the wake of the uproar in Parliament over the issue.

Sources in NCERT said they were already in the process of constitution of a new committee.

They said the cartoon used in the class XI social science textbook'Indian Constitution at Work was actually sketched back in 1948 by Keshav Shankar Pillai when the framing of the constitution was in process.

Sibal had clarified in Parliament that the textbooks are made by an independent textbook authority -- Textbook Development Committee -- which comprises academics and not officials of NCERT.

He said none of the existing members of the present Textbook Committee, which had approved the book, will be part of the new committee set up to examine objectionable caricatures.