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'Indian missions in GCC rejected school proposal'RIYADH, Aug 27, 2011 (Arab News - McClatchy-Tribune Information Services via COMTEX) -- Senior Indian Muslim politician M. Ali Ashraf Fatmi said the Indian government's proposal to open central schools (Kendriya Vidyalay) in Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states was turned down by Gulf-based Indian diplomatic missions and Indian businessmen with investments in the education sector. The proposal, he said, could still be "revised" keeping in view the growing demands of the Indian community in the Kingdom and other Gulf nations. Fatmi was in Riyadh on a personal visit to the Kingdom. Fatmi, India's former minister of state for human resources and general secretary of a major Indian political party called Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD), said India's HRD Ministry was planning to open three schools in the Kingdom. However, the plan failed, he added. The government has so far opened more than 1,085 central schools in India as well as in Moscow, Tehran, Kuwait and Katmandu. Fatmi, who was here to perform Umrah, spoke to Arab News on a range of subjects including the Organization of Islamic Cooperation's (OIC) recent remarks on Kashmir and growing Indo-Saudi relations. Fatmi called on the OIC to drop Kashmir from the agenda and allow India and Pakistan to resolve the dispute bilaterally. He said that the Indian Muslims' population was greater than the total combined population of at least 20 OIC states. On the progressively growing Indo-Saudi relations, Fatmi, who was elected four times as member of the Indian Parliament to represent the eastern Indian town of Darbhanga, said that trade and cultural links between the two countries date back to the third millennium BC. On the question of Muslim empowerment in India, Fatmi, who is also the chief of All India RJD Minority Committee, said Muslims are lagging behind in education and jobs. The Fatmi Committee of the Indian government, chaired by Fatmi himself, had recommended a 10 percent quota of jobs for Muslims. He called on the government to implement the recommendations. The committee has also recommended the opening of five campuses for India's world-class Aligarh Muslim University in Murshidabad, Kishanganj, Malappuram, Bhopal, and Pune. He, however, took exception to the state governments' lackluster response to the projects. ___ (c)2011 the Arab News (Jeddah, Saudi Arabia) Visit the Arab News (Jeddah, Saudi Arabia) at www.arabnews.com Distributed by MCT Information Services |