The stage is set for another round of political debate on the three-language formula (TLF). Ironically, our policy makers will debate the merits of three versus two languages just as the country sleepwalks into a de-facto one language policy, an English Only policy that flies in the face of common sense and expert wisdom on education. Worse, this state-sponsored cognitive, cultural and civilisational regress from multilingualism to monolingualism is being celebrated as modernity.
TLF is the official name for a policy that schoolchildren should be taught three languages. The 1968 compromise suggested the following: “Hindi, English and modern Indian language (preferably one of the southern languages) in the Hindi speaking states and Hindi, English and the Regional language in the non-Hindi speaking States.” This compromise was arrived at when the chief ministers of the country sat together to work out a language policy in the wake of anti-Hindi protests in the South. First mooted by the Radhakrishnan Commission in 1948-49 and accepted by the first education commission, the Kothari Commission, the formula was incorporated in the first and second Education Policy formulated by the Congress governments in the 1960s and 1980s.
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Here is the basic rationale for TLF: India is not just plurilingual, in that Indians speak different languages. India is multilingual in that most of the communities and individuals in our country use more than one language. Therefore, our education system must be geared towards survival and promotion of the multilingualism that is constitutive of Indian identity. There is considerable evidence now to show that multilingual education helps cognitive flexibility, divergent thinking, scholastic achievement, creativity and social tolerance. TLF is just a convenient way of operationalising multilingualism.
An expert group of linguists and educators — including D P Pattanayak and Ramakant Agnihotri — concluded that “The three-language formula is not a goal or a limiting factor in language acquisition, but rather a convenient launching pad for the exploration of the expanding horizon of knowledge and the emotional integration of the country.” (‘Position paper of the National Focus Group on Teaching of Indian Languages’, National Curriculum Framework, 2005 by the NCERT). This group recommended that children can learn, step by step, more than three languages, as learning additional languages actually helps the learning of the first and second language.
What’s the debate, then? The Union government has withheld a substantial grant under the Samagra Shiksha Scheme from Tamil Nadu for its non-compliance with the National Education Policy (NEP). The Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu, M K Stalin, has refused to accept this diktat on the ground that his party is opposed to the TLF. The state has always taught two languages — Tamil and English. Insisting on a third language, he says, is a pretext to impose Hindi. Union Minister Dharmendra Pradhan says the TN government will have to abide by the Constitution. Stalin has asked Pradhan to cite the relevant provision of the Constitution. Given its emotional overtones and the assembly election in Tamil Nadu next year, this confrontation is likely to be played out when Parliament resumes its Budget Session.
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No doubt, the DMK government has good reasons to be offended and suspicious. The Narendra Modi government has repeatedly violated the letter and spirit of federalism. The Tamil Nadu Governor is brazenly acting on behalf of the BJP. The Modi government has repeatedly encroached upon the powers of state governments in the education sector, the policy of appointment of vice-chancellors being the latest instance. Besides, the Union government cannot use central funds as a stick to force state governments to adopt education policies, that too on sensitive issues like language choice.
Having said that, there are many issues with the NEP, but the TLF is not one of them. The fact is that the NEP has simply reiterated the TLF, which was an integral part of the first and second education policy documents as well. If anything, the NEP of 2020 actually dilutes the formula by omitting any mention of Hindi. Now the TLF is that children should be taught any three languages chosen by the state, provided two of these three languages should be “native Indian” languages. And it allows classical languages like Sanskrit and Tamil to be counted within the two Indian languages. So, if Tamil Nadu wants, it can teach Tamil plus Malayalam or Telugu or Kannada, and English. It could even teach Tamil, classical Tamil and English to meet the requirements of the new TLF. So, Tamil Nadu can now consider TLF without any fear of Hindi imposition.
So, instead of opposing the TLF, the Tamil Nadu Chief Minister could offer to accept it, provided it is uniformly implemented across all states of the Indian union. He could offer to introduce Hindi in Tamil Nadu schools provided all the Hindi-speaking states adopt Tamil or any other South Indian language as the “third language”, as was indeed envisaged in the original formula. Or else, the state could introduce Classical Tamil as the third language, besides English and Tamil, just as Hindi-speaking states have introduced Sanskrit as the third language.
Such a move could highlight the simple fact that it is not Tamil Nadu but Hindi states that have sabotaged the TLF. The original consensus was for Hindi-speaking states to teach another modern Indian language, preferably a South Indian language. Initially, there were some plans of teaching Tamil in UP, Telugu in Haryana, etc. But soon the Hindi states found a short-cut. Sanskrit, or rather a rudimentary and mechanical rote learning of the language, was presented as the “third language”, thus bypassing the need to learn any other script or language. So, effectively, the TLF became an unequal bargain: While non-Hindi speakers were required to learn Hindi, Hindi speakers were not required to reciprocate. Hence, the political resentment against the TLF. It is time to call this bluff.
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If the central government is serious about TLF, and about not imposing Hindi, it should not make TLF a condition for release of central grant. Instead it should call a meeting of chief ministers, on the same lines as in 1968, and evolve a national consensus. And it must not allow Hindi-speaking states to get away with Sanskrit as a substitute for third language. This could help open up the tired political debate on language and focus on multilingualism rather than Hindi.
This would be a test of our political class to take on the elephant in the room, the hegemony of English in our education system. It may be easier to resist a repressive and authoritarian state or to stand up to an industrial-military complex than to break free of the dense web of power that is the rule of the English language.
Yadav is member, Swaraj India, and national convenor of Bharat Jodo Abhiyaan
