NEW DELHI: In what could come as a relief to school students and free up their time for activities other than academics, HRD minister Prakash Javadekar said on Saturday that the current NCERT school syllabus will be halved from the 2019 session.In an interview to the state-run Rajya Sabha TV, he said that the workload needs trimming as it is at present more than the undergraduate syllabus for arts and commerce streams.The reduction in syllabus will be applicable from class I-XII, according to sources.“At the stage of development of cognitive skills, students need to be given full freedom,” he said.Examinations and detentions in class will soon be reintroduced and a bill in this regard will be considered in Parliament in the next part of the Budget Session, HRD minister Prakash Javadekar said on Saturday. “Without examination, there is no competition and no target. There must be an element of competition for better outcomes,” he said.Javadekar also expressed concern over the poor quality of teachers, which he said was resulting in poor learning outcomes. Regarding the New Education Policy, he informed that a report in this regard will be submitted by the end of next month and it would be unveiled soon thereafter after necessary approvals.