PANAJI: Goa Vikas Party (GVP) today said the verbal duel between BJP and RSS over the medium of instruction (MOI) in primary schools is an attempt to fool the minority community in the state.
"The BJP and RSS are united and two sides of the same coin. The current verbal duel between both of them over the MOI issue is just an attempt to fool minority community ahead the 2017 state Assembly polls," GVP head Fransisco Miccky Pacheco said here.
He said BJP's stand is always anti-minority when it comes to MOI and it has reflected in their policy.
"The people want that all the schools teaching in English medium should be given grants like those to Konkani and Marathi," Pacheco said.
The Goa government had last year declared regional languages as MOI in primary schools and also gave grants to 135 schools English medium schools run by the Church.
Earlier, RSS Goa Chief Subhash Velingkar, who is spearheading agitation demanding grants be stopped to English medium schools, had criticised the BJP for their stand.
BJP MP Narendra Sawaikar reacting to Velingkar had challenged him to "face the elections" before passing any comment on the saffron party.
Pacheco today said the fight has been timed around the upcoming polls so that the minority community which supports English as MOI, stands with BJP.
"If BJP feels that regional languages alone should be the MOI, why are they not allowing Gujarati and Bengali schools to come up in the state? Will they give grants to schools teaching in these languages too," he asked.