LDF divided over Kerala Governments transfer in searching for PM SHRI funds tied to NEP

The ruling Left Democratic Front (LDF) on Sunday (October 19, 2025) appeared divided over the Kerala Government’s transfer to signal a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led Central Government to entry the sizeable funds of the Prime Minister’s Schools for Raising India (PM SHRI) purportedly tied to the imposition of the contentious National Education Policy (NEP) in States.

Kerala was among the many a number of non-BJP-ruled States, together with West Bengal and Tamil Nadu, that had demurred from implementing the scheme primarily based on the notion that NEP signalled a federal overreach into the jurisdiction of provincial governments over normal training, a concurrent listing topic.

However, General Education Minister V. Sivankutty signalled a turnabout lately by stating that signing the MOU didn’t sign that the LDF had accepted the Centre’s bid to impose the NEP over States by making it a precondition for the discharge of PM SHRI funds. 

Mr. Sivankutty said that Kerala offered its training coverage as a nationwide various to counter insidious efforts to saffronise and corporatise training. He talked about that Kerala had resisted makes an attempt to erase sure elements of Indian historical past by protecting sections that the National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT) had unilaterally eliminated.

“We have launched new textbooks to fight makes an attempt to distort historical past or promote a revanchist agenda to undermine the event of a scientific, secular and progressive mood amongst faculty college students,” he stated. 

Kerala to pursue authorized motion towards Centre over PM SHRI-linked fund block, says Education Minister

Nevertheless, Mr. Sivankutty stated Kerala might sick afford to lose the ₹1,446 crore the Centre owed the State beneath the PM SHRI scheme.

 “The authorities should take a realistic method. Kerala wants funds to extend scholar scholarships, together with for the Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe (SC/ST) communities, modernise post-matric hostels for underprivileged college students, finance analysis and publish new faculty textbooks, and improve faculty infrastructure by procuring the newest instructing aids and paying the salaries of greater than 7,000 authorities faculty academics. Currently, the State Government bears all the prices,” he stated. 

Mr. Sivankutty said that the Higher Education and Agriculture Departments had signed up for Central schemes regardless of profound ideological variations.

Kerala, Tamil Nadu, West Bengal have obtained no funds beneath Samagra Shiksha for FY2024-25

CPI takes robust exception

Communist Party of India (CPI) State Secretary Binoy Viswam instructed The Hindu that the federal government’s transfer to just accept PM SHRI funds was fiscally non-beneficial and politically incorrect. 

“The 2022 PM SHRI scheme will expire in 2026-27. The quantity the State will obtain is meagre, because the launch of funds is conditional on the well timed annual submission of utilisation certificates. Kerala has shunned the scheme for almost 5 years. The Centre won’t launch the funds with retrospective impact,” he stated. 

Mr. Viswam stated Kerala had set a mannequin for different States by rejecting the PM SHRI, which he termed because the Centre’s try and strong-arm provincial governments into accepting the “reactionary NEP”. 

He stated the NEP “denied” Darwin’s idea of evolution and positioned folklore over science. “Kerala can’t settle for NEP. Its mannequin, as normally training, presents a nationwide various to the neo-liberal, pro-corporate revanchist ideology of the Sangh Parivar. “The LDF, which is on the forefront within the battle towards the BJP’s saffronisation agenda, shouldn’t lose sight of its historic nationwide mission,” he stated.

Congress stance

Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee (KPCC) president Sunny Joseph, MLA, instructed reporters in Kozhikode that CPI ought to broadcast its loyalty to the nationwide trigger towards the BJP by asking its ministers to object to the transfer within the LDF and in addition the Cabinet. “Mere sabrerattling and token utterances of protest should not sufficient,” he stated.