Bhubaneswar/New Delhi: In a step to ensure students get direct access to buy textbooks from National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT) an online portal has been developed by the organisation that will be launched this month.
Schools and individuals can now buy the NCERT books online, will also be able to track the status of their consignment that will be delivered at their doorstep.
While 42.5 million NCERT books are used by schools affiliated to Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) the books are available only at the authorised vendors across the country.
It will also address the issues parents are facing as they are forced by some schools to buy expensive books from private publishers. School authorities claim that they recommend such books due to unavailability of NCERT books. The price of private publishers’ books is four to five times higher than the NCERT textbooks.
Another important step taken by NCERT is that rather than assessing the total number of books it needs to publish it will give at least a month’s time to the schools to upload their requirement.
Meanwhile, NCERT publishes 364 textbook titles in Hindi, English, and Urdu annually. Schools affiliated to CBSE such as Kendriya Vidyalayas and Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalayas, among others, follow NCERT curriculum. A number of states have also decided to follow it.
The NCERT is also going to carry lessons in Goods and Services Tax (GST) as well as demonetisation from the next year 2018-19. Textbooks of economics, business studies, accountancy and political science will carry contents relating to it.