No English at the cost of mother tongue

Hyderabad: Governor of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana E S L Narasimhan on Friday stressed that the learning of English by Indian students shall not be at the cost of their mother tongue.In his inaugural address at the fifth edition of International English Language Teacher Educator Conference, the Governor said India had inherited English from the British rule and English serves as a link language as different states have different languages.

The conference was being organised jointly by the British Council and the city-based English and Foreign Languages University (EFLU). This year, the three-day conference,held at the Hyderabad International Convention Centre (HICC), has the theme of ‘Ensuring Quality in English Language Teacher Education’.

The Governor said: “Even within a state, take the case of AP and Telangana as an example, three different dialects of Telugu are spoken in three of the regions. English has become a pre-requisite for every person and it is being spoken not only in offices, but also at homes. But one should not ignore the importance of mother tongue”. According to Narasimhan, if one learned his mother tongue well, learning other languages would become easy.

Vice-chancellor of EFLU, Prof Sunaina Singh echoed Governor’s sentiments when she said that the international research has proved beyond doubt that the cognitive development of a child is best achieved by learning in the medium of the child’s mother tongue. The Governor expressed concern that English learning was leading us into a society of “English haves” and “English have-nots”.

He warned people to guard against falling into the trap of elitism in the name of learning English. The Governor suggested that the “English divide” can be overcome by making English education accessible to poor children. This can be achieved by introducing English education in Government-run schools, and referred to such an initiative by the Telangana government.

Addressing a joint press conference after the inaugural session, Prof. Sunaina Singh said apart from assuring quality, access to and equity in giving English education are the tasks before universities like EFLU and other institutions. Mei-kwei Barker, Director, British Council South India, Chris Brandwood, Director English, British Council, South Asia, S Mohanraj,Dean, School of English language education, EFLU also spoke.