[MLE] Gorkhapatra goes multilingual

Dear MLE friends,
At our northern neighbour Nepal a daily newspaper has decided to go multilingual. Would that have potential in some areas in India too?
See below.
Regards,
Karsten

Karsten van Riezen
Education Consultant, SIL Int.
SIL, South Asia Group.
www.sil.org
____________________________________Gorkhapatra goes multilingual ___________________________________
The oldest publication of the country, state-owned Gorkhapatra daily, has begun its multilingual edition from September 18, which it said was an effort to reflect the inclusion of various ethnic groups.
In its first edition of the multi-lingual version, spread over two pages, the daily has published articles in Maithili, Magar, Tamang, Tamang Sangyur, Newari and Rai languages. Except in Maithili, articles in other languages focused on constituent assembly polls and federalism. In Maithili, a popular teraian satirist Dhirendra Premarshi wrote about right to education in mother tongue.
The publisher's note of the daily has highlighted the glory of decade long people's war and the Jana Andolan II that opened up way to end the centralised state mechanism and monarchy. It said the national policy must be for the inclusiveness of all dialects of the country.
It further said all the languages should be given equal right to be used in government offices based on the federal concepts and that the state should initiate the process of multilingual publications and other forms of media.
The multilingual publication policy has been brought in by the Maoist minister who heads the ministry of information and communication. Earlier, this week Minister Krishna Bahadur Mahara had announced the inclusion of programmes of various languages in all the government-owned media.
The national daily has chosen 'New Nepal, New Public Oriented Media and New Gorkhapatra' as its slogan for multilingual publication.
The daily said at least one or two pages of news, news analysis, opinion and political analysis will be published in multiple languages everyday and that all such items will be in favour of democratic republic.
Gorkhapatra has become the first newspaper in the country to be published in multiple languages. nepalnews.com ia Sep 18 07