Additional Solicitor General of India seeks more time to clarify Centre’s stand
The Karnataka High Court said that, at this stage, the government cannot insist on making Kannada a compulsory language for the first year undergraduate courses from this academic year.
The court, on 16 December, gave freedom to students to choose languages of their choice, while asking both the state government and universities not to compel students to choose Kannada as a language for the current academic year. .
A division bench of Chief Justice Ritu Raj Awasthi and Justice Sachin Shankar Magadum passed the interim order while hearing a PIL filed by Sanskrit Bharati Karnataka Trust, Bengaluru and others and another petition filed by Shivakumar KG and other students.
The petitioners have challenged the state’s policy of making Kannada a compulsory language for UG courses from this academic year on the “pretext of implementing NEP 2020”.
“Prima facie, we are of the view that the issue of making Kannada a compulsory language in higher education based on the National Policy on Education (NEP) 2020 is a question that needs to be considered. Therefore, at this stage the state government will not insist on making Kannada language compulsory,” the court said in its order.
Though the bench had on December 13 directed the state government and universities not to pursue the matter, the petitioner-students’ counsel Sridhar Prabhu submitted that they were unable to choose the languages of their choice for the current academic year.
Advocate-General Prabhuling K. Navadgi submitted that the petitioner-students should not face any difficulty in studying Kannada language in the UG first year course as the records show that all of them studied Kannada as a language before their second year. did. -University course.
The AG also said that so far four lakh students have been admitted to UG courses and the admission process is almost over, and any order on the language policy will affect the academic programme.
Additional Solicitor General of India MB Nargund sought more time to clarify the Centre’s stand on the state government’s policy to make Kannada compulsory for UG courses on the pretext of implementing NEP 2020, as the Center has been asked by all states in this regard. Counseling is needed, as is any. The decision taken by the Center in this regard will have pan-India effect.
When the AG requested to limit the benefit of the interim order to the students who filed the petition, the bench orally rejected the request saying that all the students would have to avail the benefit of the interim order. While adjourning further hearing, the bench orally told the AG, “Don’t politicize the issue.”
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