Shimla: Renowned painters Sobha Singh and Nicholas Roerich have replaced artist M.F. Husain in Himachal Pradesh text books, an official said on Thursday.

"We have decided to replace the chapter on M.F. Husain in the NCERT Hindi book taught to class XI students from this session," Himachal Pradesh Board of School Education Chairman Chaman Lal Gupta told the sources.

He said that now a chapter on renowned artists Sobha Singh and Nicholas Roerich would be included in the text books.

"A chapter on Sobha Singh and Nicholas Roerich would be taught to the class XI students as they could play an important role to ignite the young minds, whereas Husain's chapter was totally irrelevant," he said.

The decision to introduce the new chapter was taken by the board at its meeting on Wednesday, Gupta said.

"The decision to remove Husain's chapter from the next session was taken last year. At yesterday's (Wednesday) meeting, we decided to include the chapter on Sobha Singh and Nicholas Roerich," the official added.

"The changes in the NCERT-prescribed book were taken as per the guidelines of the NCERT. Every state has a right to change up to 20 percent of the content of NCERT books, so there is nothing wrong in this regard," he said.

One of the greatest Indian artists of the 20th century, Sobha Singh was born on November 29, 1901, in Punjab.

After partition, Sobha Singh set up his studio at Andretta, located in the foothills of the Dhauladhar ranges in the picturesque Kangra valley. His focus was on Sikh gurus and their life and work.

Nicholas Roerich was a Russian painter, philosopher, scientist, writer and traveller, who set up his base near Kullu in 1928 where he lived the last period of his life. IANS