Activists campaigning for their mother tongues have formed an India level trust named ‘Campaign for Language Equality and Rights Trust’. The Trust mainly aims to spread awareness throughout India about the importance of mother tongues in education, services, administration, culture and other linguistic domains. To work for making all scheduled languages the official languages of the Indian Union and inclusion of the unrecognized ones in the scheduled list, for obtaining equality of all Indian mother tongues at all levels, and for ensuring linguistic rights of the speakers of Indian mother tongues are other objectives which the Trust wants to pursue.
Dr. Joga Singh, the President of the trust, in his statement released to the press has said that Indian language policy is completely on a wrong track. Leave aside the results of the worldwide research and the opinions of the language and education experts, the Indian policy makers have turned a completely blind eye to even the recommendations of all commissions and committees formed on the issue after independence. As a result of this, he said, the ruination of Indian education, languages and cultures is pretty obvious now. Along with this, it has negatively affected the domains of administration, services, inclusive growth, just and democratic social set-up, establishment of a genuinely federal structure, and sense of unity among Indian people.
Dr. Joga Singh said that some myths about language issues which most of Indian people are carrying in their minds are the primary reasons for Indian language policy being on an erroneous track. We, he said, need to look at the fact that only the countries which have based each field of their life on mother tongues are ahead in education, trade and commerce, knowledge, science, and technology. But India, by neglecting her mother tongues, has shackled its energy and talent. This has also created serious difficulties for each field of the country’s life. It is very much essential, therefore, that the language policy attested internationally and recommended by the experts be put in place throughout the country. This policy guides us to give primary place to mother tongues in each linguistic domain. To achieve this goal, we need to pool together the efforts being made by Indian mother tongues activists across the country. The ‘Campaign for Language Equality and Rights Trust’ will keep making its sincere efforts in this direction, he said.
Dr. Joga Singh told that the beginning for the establishment of this trust was made in September 2015 when Tamil language activists organized a gathering in Chennai and a platform with the name ‘Campaign for Language Equality and Rights’ was floated there. A large number of activists from eight languages, including Dr. Joga Singh, participated in that gathering. The platform had such an impressive response that within a period of less than six months it could gather representatives from forty languages in Delhi on 21st February 2016, the International Mother Languages Day. A common demand charter was released on that day.
Dr. Joga Singh (Punjab) has been nominated as President, Mr. Senthil Nathan (Tamilnadu) as Secretary, Mr. Anand Guru (Karnataka) as Vice-President, and Dr. Rawail Singh (Delhi) as the Treasurer of the Trust. Dr. P. Pavithran (Keralam), Dr. Deepak Pawar (Maharashtra), Dr. Garga Chatterjee (West Bengal), Mr. Saket Sahu (Odisha) and Mr. K.S. Priyank (Karnataka) are the other founding trustees. The Trust has made an appeal to all Indian citizens to connect actively with the Trust’s activities.
