[Assam] A letter to The Editor

[kamal deka]

The following letter,appeared in The Sentinel,is quite interesting.
KJD
     Letters to the Editor       * *

: *Do we Respect our Own Language?*

Through The Sentinel I would like to draw the attention of the Chief
Minister of Assam, Tarun Gogoi, that in its Eighth Schedule, the
Constitution of India recognizes 22 major Indian languages including
Assamese, Bengali, Bodo, Hindi, Nepali, Urdu etc.
Long ago in 1960, the Assam Government proclaimed Assamese as the State’s
official language, just as Bengali is the State’s official language in
neighbouring West Bengal. As we all know, the State Civil Service
Examination conducted by the WPSC (West Bengal Public Service Commission)
consists of one compulsory paper in Bengali/Hindi/Nepali/Urdu with
compulsory papers in English and General Studies and other optional
subjects.
Likewise, a candidate who takes the Civil Service Examination conducted by
the UPSC must select one language paper from among the 22 language papers
and he/she must secure pass marks in that paper. In our State too, the APSC
(Assam Public Service Commission) conducts the State Civil Service
Examination, but there is no provision for a compulsory language paper.
The 70th session of the Asom Sahitya Sabha was recently held in Dhemaji. In
the session, the newly elected president of the Sabha,  Rong Bong Terang,
said that ‘‘language is the soul of a nation’’ and ‘‘without it a nation
cannot at all prosper’’. Again, in the international arena, Assamese is
among the 21 Indian languages that finds a place in the application forms
brought out by the present US Government, which has a total of 101 languages
from across the world listed in the form’s “international experience”
section. No doubt, this is good news for Assam and the entire Northeast.
Again, in terms of the number of speakers, Assamese is ranked 46th among all
the languages of the world. But the fact remains that even after 61 years of
independence, the status of Assamese language in its own land has barely
improved.
In my view, the time has come when we ought to question ourselves: Is
Assamese language getting its due respect?
Amit Chakraborty,
Udyapur, Birubari,
Guwahati-16.
JD