Official State Languages query

[gail at utxvms.cc.utexas.edu]

My impression of the situation regarding official languages in India is
that the speakers of these languages had sufficient political power to get
their languages on the list. I am sure that if Tulu and Marwari speakers
made the effort they could get their languages considered as candidates
too. 

The important issue concerning official languages is that speakers of
these languages can receive education in their own language -- this is a
right that, I believe, any speaker of any language should have (depending
ofcourse on available financial resources). Personally, I think India
needs three categories: (i) National languages -- Hindi and English, (ii)
State languages -- the 18 that are currently called official languages and
which are languages of government in at least one state, and (iii)
Official languages -- all those that can linguistically be identified as
languages rather than dialects. The status of Official Language should
include the right to open schools in these languages. It is true the list
of category (iii) would be huge, but after all the 'right to schools' does
not necessarily mean that the government has to run these schools, only
that people who have the money and energy for it can open such schools if
they wish. It would be more feasible to restrict such schools to the
elementary level because secondary level education involves the problem of
holding public examinations in all these languages. In any case, India is
a long way from being able to do this, so I just keep on dreaming!! 

Gail Coelho


On Mon, 19 Aug 1996, Pullat Devadas Das Menon wrote:

> I believe that Marwari is a dialect amd mot a language - a language being
> defined as having a script, and more importantly its own literature. There
> are over 200 dialects in India, all of which are in use. Since these are
> dialects they do not find mention in the list of official languages.
> 
> Das Menon
> 
> At 01:45 PM 8/16/96 BST, you wrote:
> >And how can India not recognize the important of Marwari?
> >David Magier
> >
> >
> 
> 
>