For the past seven days, members of the Aikya Malayala Prasthanam, an organisation that works for the promotion of Malayalam, have been on a hunger strike in front of the Kerala Public Service Commission's office. They're demanding that the authorities facilitate answering the PSC and the Kerala Administrative Service exam in Malayalam.
"In 2017, the state government has decided to accept Malayalam as its official language. But at the same time, the same state conducts all its public service examinations in English. This happens in a state where 98 per cent of the people speak Malayalam," says P Pavithran, a representative of the organisation. Another demand is to create a provision to write the exam also in Tamil and Kannada, which are spoken by a large number of people in the state.
"The government had introduced the Kerala Administrative Service examination as a step to decentralise power. But there is no decentralisation of language here. Why cannot you write the exam in Malayalam when there is a provision to write the UPSC examinations in the language?" asks Pavithran. "Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan also was of the opinion that the medium of questions and answers of KAS must be in Malayalam. But now, they've all gone against this," he adds.
Currently, two activists, NP Priyesh, Malayalam Aikyavedi state secretary and S Rubima, a PhD scholar are on hunger strike. Also, a lot of activists and academics including Adoor Gopalakrishnan and Sugathakumari have extended their support to the cause.
