Multilingual Education and India

Every now and then the state government education department picks up on the language issue. The Uttarakhand government is probably taking the lead on that. Based on a positive experience among the Jaunsari they have started to develop a book to utilize Gharwali and Kumauni in the classroom at the primary level.

Grassroot level research is rare. Dr Cynthia Groff lived for months with girls in a hostel in the Kumaun area of Uttarakhand (North India) and researched how the local language is used in different settings. Her PhD research has now resulted in a book: The Ecology of Language in Multilingual India: Voices of Women and Educators in the Himalayan Foothills .

Kumauni & Gharwali taught at schools in Uttarakhand Photo: http://www.shaktihimalaya.com/   The government of Uttarakhand has decided to have the two major vernacular languages of the state, Kumauni and Gharwali, taught at all the primary schools. The article " Grads in Kumaoni, Garhwali may be taken as primary, junior school teachers "  in the Times of India presents it an an employment opportunity, but it seems much more than that.  The article quotes Prof Dr.. S.S. Bisht saying: ""This is very good news for us, as teaching the languages to students from class I will help revive not only the dialects but also their associated cultures," Interestingly now the state is struggling to find enough qualified teachers to implement this: "It will be difficult to meet such a high demand in so short time. However, from this academic year, we have introduced options to study the language as an elective or as a single-subject course to increase the n