The Supreme Court on Friday modified its March 11 order that had directed the Centre, states and others to disassociate from three academicians following a row over an NCERT book chapter containing “offending” contents on corruption in the judiciary.
The apex court, which considered the explanation given by the three academicians, left it open to the Centre, states, Union Territories, public universities and institutions that receive funds from the central or state governments to take an independent decision on the issue without being influenced by its observations made in the March 11 order.
A bench of Chief Justice of India (CJI) Surya Kant and Justices Joymalya Bagchi and Vipul M Pancholi also recalled a part of the March 11 order that had recorded that the three academicians — Professor Michel Danino, Suparna Diwakar and Alok Prasanna Kumar — had “deliberately and knowingly” misrepresented the facts in order to project a negative image of the Indian judiciary to the students of Class 8.
The bench passed the order while hearing an application filed by the three academicians, who explained their stand and said that no individual had the sole say in the drafting of the content and it was a collective process.
