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Tie-ups to promote French language planned

— Photo: T. Singaravelou

Education Minister M.O.H.F. Shahjahan at the newly-renovated library at Alliance Francaise in Puducherry on Saturday.

PUDUCHERRY: The Education Department is looking forward to establishing Public-Private-Partnership tie-ups to set up a foreign language centre and start language workshops to promote French and take it to the students.

Education Minister M.O.H.F. Shahjahan on Saturday said the Puducherry government wanted to promote French language not only in schools but also take spoken French to students by means of tie-ups through the Pondicherry Institute of Linguistics Society.

He was speaking shortly after inaugurating the renovated library at Alliance Francaise. “A lot of French BPOs and companies should come to Puducherry as it has a large population of French-speaking people. The students are technically sound and there is availability of good human resource here,” he said. With a view to promoting foreign languages, Mr. Shahjahan said, “We want to create a foreign language centre to promote languages such as English and French. French language should be promoted from the school level. We also want to start a French college in the future,” Mr. Shahjahan said.

One of the key focus areas of the government was education, he said and added that they wanted to make Puducherry as an educational hub.

Alliance Francaise president V. Nallam said the Alliance Francaise of Pondicherry had excelled in its activities to become number two in India. The presence of French people and francophone was an important bridge between the two great civilisations, he said.

“The renovated library has preserved important books and has new books. Many new sections have been created in the library and the whole system has been computerised and linked with other Alliance Francaises in India,” Dr. Nallam said.

With the Government Library at Romain Rolland consisting of a French section, he said it had old and useful books dating to 18th and 19th centuries. “I request the Education Minister to give instructions to save the books. It will be nice if the books of historical importance are preserved,” he said.

On the occasion, a book written by an author from Kerala, K.P. Ramannuni, and translated into French was presented.

Deputy Consul General of France in Pondicherry Francois Striby and Director of Alliance Francaise Michel Houdayer spoke.

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