Karnataka   

Language policy: meet on verdict today

BANGALORE: The State Government is all set to hold a meeting of its officials on Monday to discuss the ramifications of the Karnataka High Court order last week on the language policy.

The meeting, to be attended by officials of the Education Department, is likely to discuss several issues arising out of the verdict and the next course of action.

As the verdict says that children have the right to choose their medium of instruction, the State feels that its right to protect Kannada as a medium of instruction and prescribe it as a language has suffered a blow. Highly placed officials feel that English medium schools and hundreds of private unaided institutions could take shelter under the verdict and request the State to permit them to switch over from Kannada and other languages as the medium of instruction to English.

The officials, however, do not foresee any problem at present in insisting that schools coming under the Karnataka Unaided Schools Management Association (KUSMA) and other associations adhere to the medium of instruction in which they had been granted permission.

They say the problem would arise only when the institutions make an application to the State for teaching in English. The State now cannot cite the language policy as the reason for rejecting the application. It has to find other reasons, such as provisions in the Education Act, to deny schools permission to teach in English.

Sources in the office of the Advocate-General and government advocates who contested the case in the High Court told The Hindu that they had suggested to the Education Department to postpone Monday’s meeting as the certified copy of the judgment was yet to be given to them.

They said the Government could take a concrete decision on the issue only after the Advocate-General gave his opinion. This could be done only if the certified copy of the judgment was received. Discussions then would be more fruitful and grounds for an appeal in the Supreme Court could be prepared.

The sources said the main ground in the special leave petition (SLP), if filed, would be the case relating to the Maharashtra Government versus the Gujarati Association.

Meanwhile, a majority of the members of the legal fraternity have expressed concern and anguish over the remarks and reaction of people and politicians to the verdict.

Advocates, including those who fought the case in the High Court, point out that people should gracefully accept the verdict and if they feel that they have been wronged they could file an SLP in the Supreme Court.

Puttige Ramesh, one of the advocates who argued the language case in the High Court on behalf of minority institutions, says that any judgment should be viewed in its entirety and not read piece meal.

A single judge is slated to hear on Monday 40 cases, most of them relating to withdrawal of recognition. The State had withdrawn recognition to hundreds of schools after it found that they had violated the policy on the medium of instruction.

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