Never proposed ban on sex education, Vardhan clarifies

Under attack over his views on sex education in schools, Union Health Minister Harsh Vardhan today dismissed reports that he has proposed such a ban.
Reacting to media reports that he has proposed a ban on sex education in schools, he said the views expressed on his website in this regard was entirely his own. He said he made these views in the context of the UPA government's 2007 decision to introduce Adolescence Education Programme in its original form.
The Minister, who is currently on an official visit to Unites States, said, "I am a medical professional who has embraced rationalism and I whole-heartedly support pedagogy that is scientific and culturally acceptable."

"Anything abrasive to common sensibilities and articulated as such by responsible persons should be discarded and replaced by consensually accepted learning processes," he said.
Vardhan said as a the chief ministerial candidate of his party in the 2013 elections, he had full right to make transparent his agenda for education among other subjects of governance.
Value-based school learning processes are common in all countries and he had intended implementing such a format in Delhi's schools, he said.
"Crudity and graphic representation of culturally objectionable symbols as manifested in the UPA's so called sex education programme cannot be called sex education. Every education system must strive to have an ideal curriculum and to that extent my stand is valid," the Minister said.

"Sex education that builds societies free of gender discrimination, teenage pregnancy, HIV-AIDS proliferation, pornography addiction etc. Should be the goal," he added.