Sacramento, CA: In what appeared to a final step in putting to rest, marathon review of sixth grade textbooks, California State Board of Education (CSBE), on March 8th made some major concessions to Hindu groups after another round of passionate and often heated public comments.

The board this time felt some pressure after the February 27th fiasco. After public hearing during 27th meeting, they passed the resolution in less than 30 seconds without any deliberations to accept half-baked edits, which left many discrepancies. This had enraged many Hindus. The board also wanted to disassociate itself from the Michael Witzel and other unsavory groups who were opposing the edits and was possibly hoping to avoid litigation by doing so.

In what appeared to be an about turn, the president Glee Johnson, gave four directives to the staff member Dr. Tom Adams to address inconsistencies (there were few instances where the negative comments were removed from one book, but not from other), to add paragraph, indicating old Aryan Invasion Theory is disputed by many scholars, to use deity appropriately and finally, to use sacred text instead of poem or songs to describe Hindu scriptures. These four directives constituted for major concession for Hindus, who were fighting for justice.

It appeared that this meeting too was a public show, possibly to satisfy some procedural matters to avoid legal actions by Hindu American Foundation (HAF). Unfortunately, they did not expect the force of Hindu groups.

In two hour public comment period, the supporters of Hindu Education Foundation (HEF) and Vedic Foundation (VF) continued to highlight procedural violations, inconsistencies in their decision to adopt some changes (while retaining same errors in other textbooks) and continued to question the capabilities of so called experts school board had hired to correct the textbooks.

As an example, Mr. Khanderao Kand indicated that board has violated many of its own guidelines and worked behind the closed doors violating Brown Act. He also highlighted the fact that “accusers were hired as judge and jury”.

Prof. Shiva Bajpai, former member of the Ad-Hoc committee urged that if nothing else, at least the inconsistencies be removed. He said, “I am not here to support one side or the other. All I wish is to remove the inconsistencies.” Jnaneshwari Devi of Vedic Foundation and Eshan Katir highlighted the inconsistencies visually by showing large placards showing corrected text in one book and another placard showing retention of original text in other textbook.

Jeevan Zutshi, a Kashmiri Pundit, who has been personally affected by Islamic terrorism said, “Though I am personally affected by Islamic Terrorism, I would not blame Islam. Similarly, though caste system exists in modern day, it can’t be attributed to Hinduism.”

Mr. Desai of Friends of India Society International also highlighted the lack of expertise and anti-Hindu racist tendencies of present Content Review Panel consisting of Prof. Witzel, Hietzman and Wolpert. Highlighting role of women in Hinduism, he said “To put it in modern terminology, Women in Hinduism control Finance, Defense, Education and Agriculture departments”, referring to Goddesses Laxmi, Saraswati, Durga and Annapurna.

But this was not one sided affair. There were few, who opposed the changes in the textbooks. Speakers from two major groups, Friends of South Asia (FOSA), with links to Communist party of India, Coalition against Communalism (CAC), yet another offshoot with links communists and Gurdas Sabha of Sacramento also spoke.

FOSA and CAC members, many like Shalini Gera, Angana Chatterjee, Nalini Shekar and Anu Mandavelli continued to bring Indian politics into the picture without making any points regarding the edits themselves.

Members of Gurdas Sabha, claimed that they were dalits and were discriminated against and hence the references should remain (even though, they were historically inaccurate).

Angana Chatterjee, was overheard in the hall ways claiming that it is very difficult to stop them (HEF and VF) as they have great grassroots support.

All in all, it appears that though, Hindus have made great stride, there is more to come.