New Delhi, June 18: The NCERT has removed portions about the 2002 Gujarat riots, Emergency, Cold War, Naxalite movement and Mughal courts from its class 12 textbooks as part of its "syllabus rationalisation" exercise.

The National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT) has cited "overlapping" and "irrelevant" as reasons for dropping those portions from the syllabus.

Many of these changes were announced earlier this year when the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) rationalised its syllabi in April.

Besides schools under CBSE, some state boards also use NCERT textbooks.

Listing the changes, the NCERT, in a note, said, "The content of the textbooks has been rationalised for various reasons, including overlapping with similar content in other subject areas in the same class, similar content included in the lower or higher classes on the same subject.

It also stated that difficulty level, content which is easily accessible to students without much intervention from teachers and can be learned by self-learning or peer-learning and content which is irrelevant in the present context have been removed.

In class 12 political science textbook, pages on the topic 'Gujarat Riots' will be excluded from the chapter titled 'Recent Developments in Indian Politics'. The mention of the National Human Rights Commission report on the 2002 violence and the "raj dharma" remark by then Prime Minister Atal Bihar Vajpayee has been dropped from the textbook.

Also, chapters on Mughal courts in a history textbook, a poem on the Dalit movement and a chapter on the Cold War, are among the exclusions from the political science textbook.

In Class 10, the excluded chapters included verses of poet Faiz Ahmed Faiz in the 'Religion, Communalism and Politics Communalism, Secular State' section of the textbook 'Democratic Politics II'.

Also, chapters titled 'Democracy and Diversity', 'Popular Struggle and movements' and 'Challenges to Democracy' have been dropped.

In the social science textbook of classes seven and eight, references to Dalit writer Omprakash Valmiki were removed. In the class seven textbook titled 'Our Pasts-2', the topic 'Emperors: major campaigns and events', has been removed.

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Barcelona (AP): Real Madrid slapped players Federico Valverde and Aurélien Tchouaméni with half-a-million-euro ($588,000) fines on Friday for their altercation during practice.

The massive fines came a day after the midfielders tussled when the team trained. Valverde said in a post on social media on Thursday that no punches were thrown. But Valverde knocked his head on a table and he suffered a small cut that required a brief hospital visit.

On social media, Valverde initially called it a “meaningless fight” with a teammate and said “everything has been blown out of proportion."

His employers, however, considered it a significant enough breach of team discipline to nail both Valverde and Tchouaméni with fines that bite even the bank account of a top soccer player. The half-a-million euro penalties reflect the reputational damage the club was enduring in a chaotic end to a disappointing season.

In a statement, the 15-time European champion said its disciplinary action was concluded after both players expressed to the club “their complete remorse for what happened and apologized to one another.”

Madrid added they also apologized to their teammates, the coaching staff and club supporters, as well as showing their willingness to accept whatever disciplinary action the club deemed “opportune.”

Tchouaméni was back training with Madrid on Friday, two days before they play at Barcelona in a clasico. Madrid has to win otherwise Barcelona will be crowned La Liga champion.

After being notified of the fine, he posted a public apology to the club and its fans on social media.

“What happened this week in training is unacceptable,” Tchouaméni wrote. "I say this while thinking about the example we are expected to set for young people, whether in football or at school.

“Above all, I am sorry for the image we projected of the club.”

Valverde was not at practice due to the head knock.

Both players are set to play in the World Cup next month, with Tchouaméni playing for France and Valverde for Uruguay. 

Chaotic end to a poor season

===================

The run-in between the players, who for seasons have played side by side in Madrid's midfield, came after they argued this week in previous training sessions. But tempers boiled over on Thursday. Spanish media was rife with reports that the players previously disagreed over the club's decision to let coach Xabi Alonso go after just months on the job.

It was not the only altercation involving Madrid players during training this week. Álvaro Carreras confirmed he was in a “minor” incident with a teammate. Spanish media said he and fellow defender Antonio Rüdiger got into a scuffle.

Álvaro Arbeloa, the coach who was promoted from Madrid's reserve team when Alonso was fired in January, will face tough questions on what went wrong inside the changing room when he gives a press conference on Saturday ahead of the clasico at Camp Nou.

Madrid is facing a second consecutive campaign without a major trophy amid rumors in the Spanish media that club president Florentino Pérez is considering bringing back Jose Mourinho to straighten out his underperforming team.