Kohima, November 27: Amidst the affiliation row, several prominent Naga civil organisations today said that Nagas living in Manipur had decided to opt for the Nagaland Board of School Education (NBSE) because of numerous reasons prevailing in the Board of Secondary Education Manipur (BSEM) of which the most important are imposition of Meitei Script (Meitei Mayek) and �distortion of Naga history� in the officially prescribed textbooks of the BSEM.

The Naga Hoho, the Naga Students� Federation (NSF) and the Naga Mothers� Association (NMA) in a joint statement said the Nagas had sought affiliation of private schools from �four Naga hill districts� to the NBSE on the conviction that the syllabus prescribed by the NBSE is far better than the syllabus of the BSEM.

�This move is genuine in every aspect of humanism, as we strongly believe that imposition of any system/will is not acceptable for the Nagas as we have been resisting all through our lives the forcible imposition of anything,� the statement said.

On HSLC scholarship, the Naga organisations pointed out that the budget is directly allocated by the Ministry of Tribal Affairs according to the number of (college/higher secondary) students registered in the higher secondary schools and colleges which does not burden the State exchequer.

They said that affiliation of schools from outside Nagaland to NBSE would not affect the prevailing employment policy of the Government of Nagaland, adding that employment and affiliation were two different matters that should not be mixed up and create confusion.

�Every State Government has its own employment policy in recruiting human resources into any category of Government jobs.

�Likewise Nagaland Government too has its own policy of employing its own citizens,� stated the statement issued by the Naga civil societies.

The Naga organisations also pointed out that Naga students who are pursuing their studies in other States are not guaranteed any job by the State Government where they are studying.

Similarly, students who are interested in affiliating to the NBSE could not be guaranteed a job by the Nagaland Government.