Kannur (Kerala) | Kerala General Education Minister V Sivankutty on Tuesday said that the government would not allow the "blending of religion with education" and reiterated that there would be no change in the revised school timings.
Under the revised timetable, high school students (classes 8 to 10) will spend an extra 15 minutes in the morning and another 15 minutes in the afternoon on each working day except Fridays to help schools reach the required 1,100 instructional hours per year.
However, the decision has been criticised by various Muslim outfits, including the Samastha Kerala Jamiyyathul Ulama, a prominent body of Sunni clerics, who argue that the "extended hours will affect religious education".
Sivankutty, speaking to a TV channel here, contended that organisations representing "certain communities" should confine themselves to religious matters.
"The government is there to intervene in matters of education," he said, adding that "education and religion should not be blended, and there is no question of allowing it." At the same time, he also said that if someone wants to point out something regarding education, the same is welcome.
"If a particular group says it needs to understand what is happening, we are willing to hold talks with them. But there will be no change in the decision regarding school timings," Sivankutty clarified.
The minister had recently defended the state's new academic calendar for 2025-26, which includes longer school hours and select working Saturdays to meet "national and state education standards." Regarding the revised timings, he had said that the move follows a directive from the Kerala High Court, which had ruled in August 2024 that a previously issued academic calendar which included 25 working Saturdays was not "legally valid as it lacked proper government approval."
