Karnataka government on Monday asked the Centre to support its stand on the language policy.
Karnataka government on Monday asked the Centre to support its stand on the language policy. It has appealed to the Centre to ensure “convergence of approach” in the approach of the state and Union governments when the state’s appeal in Supreme Court, against an order of the Karnataka High Court on its language policy, comes up for hearing later this month.
Chief minister BS Yeddyurappa wrote a letter to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh about the issue, saying: “It may be advisable for governments of India and Karnataka to adopt a similar stand while filing the counter affidavit before Supreme Court when the state’s special leave petition (SLP) comes up for hearing by this month-end.”
Karnataka is fighting against the private education schools over the medium of instructions over the last 15 years.
The state government’s stand is to make the mother tongue a compulsory medium of instructions in schools.
If the Supreme Court gives an adverse verdict, then it is going to affect all the states in India, therefore all the more important for the Union government to make its stand clear, he said in a letter.
The Karnataka High Court had on July 2, 2008 struck down the 1994 language policy that made Kannada the compulsory medium of instruction in primary schools.
Challenging this, the state filed the SLP in the apex court. Seeking to capitalise on the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act recently enacted by Parliament, Yeddyurappa said Section 29 (2)(f) of the Act stated that the medium of instructions shall, as far as practicable, be in the child’s mother tongue.
“I request that you may kindly advise the Union ministry of human resources development (HRD) in this regard so that there is convergence in approach between the Centre and the state when the matter is heard by Supreme Court,” he said in the letter.
Reacting to this letter, Karnataka Unaided Schools Management Association (KUSMA) said it is a technique of building pressure on the Central government.
“But we hope ultimately the apex court will uphold the children’s and parents’ rights. Nobody should overrule the constitutional rights of the citizens,” said KUSUMA chairman GS Sharma.
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