Agartala: Animesh Debbarma, Tripura Leader of the Opposition, on Friday, lashed out at the state government for its ignorance towards the demand of Roman Script for Kokborok, the most widely-spoken language of the state’s indigenous people.
Vehemently condemning the recent showdown between protestors and police resulting in a lathi charge, Debbarma said, “The government is taking advice from those who had nothing to do with the Kokborok. The language should be taught and written in a script accepted by the students. Imposing Bengali script on students studying in English Medium schools from an early age will make the situation far more difficult for the students. When the students went to seek answers, they were greeted with Lathi charge and water cannons.”
The senior TIPRA Motha leader was referring to the police lathi charge on TISF (TIPRA Indigenous Students’ Federation) that left several activists of the opposition party affiliated students’ outfit injured. According to Debbarma, “By nature, the Central Board of Secondary Education-controlled schools are English medium which means the language of communication is English. Now, if a student studying English for ten years is asked to read his mother tongue in Bengali (only Bengali script would be accepted) in the answer sheet is an act of injustice.”
He said the Chief Minister informed him that the CBSE has no provision for preparing question papers in two different scripts. “I have been the proponent of dual script question papers since the very beginning because it will serve the purpose of all kinds of students. Even in all the state’s colleges and universities, the students can write their Kokborok answer sheet in whichever script they prefer. If we have to choose only one script, it should be the Roman script as 95 per cent of the students want its implementation in all the educational institutions,” Debbarma told reporters.
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He also took a dig at the proposal of using Devanagari, saying, “If Devanagari is so special, let all the regional languages practice and use this script by setting aside the present system.”
The Leader of the Opposition also questioned the state government’s decision to allow aspirants from all over India to appear in the competitive exams for selecting teachers, engineers and other posts. “Our state is already facing the ugliest unemployment crisis. If a person from Mumbai or Bihar gets selected for the teacher post and gets posted in a remote area, how would he teach there without knowledge of the local language? The state government should consider all these issues. Besides, many people are being given re-appointment depriving the young TCS officers of getting promoted to the IAS cadre. And, the reservation policy is being flouted blatantly in these cases. The outsourcing jobs are also being given violating all the regulations of reservation,” he added.
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