Bhubaneswar/Sambalpur, Oct. 6: Naba Kishore Nayak, 13, a Class IX student of Unit-VIII Boys' High School here, was not ready to accept that Mahanadi, the state's largest river, originated from Sihawa mountain in Chhattisgarh's Dhamtari district and not from Amarkantak.

Nayak told The Telegraph: "Only last week our teacher taught us about the origin of the river and also showed a map depicting its course from Amarkantak. Our geography book also says that the river originates from Amarkantak."

Not only Nayak, government textbooks have been feeding wrong information to around five lakh students studying in state-run high schools across Odisha.

The wrong information about the river's origin has been there in the textbook ( Bhugal O Arthaniti, published by Board of Secondary Education, Odisha government, 2016) for quite some time, but no one had spotted it till environmentalist from Sambalpur Durga Prasad Nath recently brought it to the notice of the board and the government.

After the Board of Secondary Education came to know about the blooper, it decided to make corrections in the textbook from the next academic year.

Admitting that it's a "serious blunder", the new president of the Board of Secondary Education, Sushant Kumar Das, told The Telegraph: "It's a mistake on our part. I have asked the expert committee comprising eminent educationists to look into the grave error and do the needful."

Das said he had received several complaints on the issue from various corners of the state.

Nath said: "While the actual origin of the river Mahahadi is at the Sihawa mountain in Chhattisgarh, the book mentions Amarkantak as the source of Mahanadi."

In his letter to the board, as well as the state government, Nath suggested that corrections should be made in the textbook.

"The geography book of Class IX says that the river originates from the Amarkantak plateau and enters Odisha through Jharsuguda district. This is absolutely incorrect. The river originates from Sihawa mountain at Dhamtari district in Chhattisgarh," he said.

While the textbook of the Board of Secondary Education gives incorrect information, the textbook of the Chhattisgarh government states Sihawa mountain as the river's origin, Nath said.

"The ongoing controversy between Odisha and Chhattisgarh made me think about collecting facts about the river. I read Amarkantak as the origin of the river in some media reports. However, when I was in school, I had read that the Mahanadi originates from Bastar district. Subsequently, I started studying about the river and found Sihawa as the origin of the river," he said, adding that the aerial distance between Sihawa and Amarkantak is 300km.

"Later, I collected maps which also confirmed that Mahanadi originated from Sihawa," he said.

In August, Nath wrote to the secretary, Board of Secondary Education, minister for schools and mass education and director, schools and mass education, requesting them to rectify the mistake.

"I have given documents running into 11 pages to substantiate my statement," he said.