Chaos was unleashed on the eve of International Mother Tongue Day as Tamil Nadu condemned the National Education Policy (NEP) and a three-language mandate — where students are required to learn three languages, their mother tongue, Hindi and English.
The battle, which started with the release of funds to the state, has now exacerbated into a battle of policies over the implementation of language in educational curricula.
While the "three-language" policy has been rejected by the DMK-led Tamil Nadu government, today, Friday, February 21, Union Minister Dharmendra Pradhan took to social media platforms to deride the state for its stance on the Center's policies.
"Highly inappropriate for a State to view NEP 2020 with a myopic vision and use threats to sustain political narratives," he wrote on X.
He further appealed to the masses not to "politicise education and rise above political differences in the best interest of our students."
While this can be perceived as a tussle that seeks to promote Hindi as a commonly used language, the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) government has also alleged that although the Centre with the NEP seeks to promote regional cultures and languages, it has failed to uplift Tamil Nadu's existing status, as it still awaits an amount of Rs 2,150 crore of Samagra Shiksha funds.
Sasikanth Senthil, Member of Lok Sabha from Tamil Nadu, posted on X today, questioning the validity of the NEP and its all-encompassing objective.
"If NEP 2020 promises linguistic diversity, why does it seem some languages are more ‘diverse’ than others? While Tamil Nadu is urged to embrace Hindi, one wonders—how many students in Uttar Pradesh or Madhya Pradesh are learning Tamil, Kannada, or Bengali? And how many teachers for these languages have been hired under NEP?"
In his letter to Tamil Nadu CM MK Stalin, Dharmendra Pradhan mentioned that the three-language policy has been the "backbone of India's education framework since 1968."
However, netizens quickly gathered data to demonstrate that despite Tamil Nadu's adherence to the two-language policy, the state has still achieved remarkable academic success.
Read this:While Member of Parliament Karti P Chidambaram took a dig at the policy.
While Member of Parliament Karti P Chidambaram took a dig at the policy.
And, while education should have been the epicentre of the narrative, it turned into a battle of the languages.
The Tamil Nadu government has been claiming that Hindi is being subtly imposed on the state through the NEP.
What do you think of it? Let us know in the comments.
