The Maharashtra government has escalated its demand to accord classical language status to Marathi as senior Shiv Sena leader Subhash Desai met Union Culture Minister G Kishan Reddy on Monday
Representational Image. PTI
The Maharashtra government has escalated its demand to accord classical language status to Marathi as senior Shiv Sena leader Subhash Desai met Union Culture Minister G Kishan Reddy on Monday.
Desai, who holds the portfolios of Industry and Marathi Language Department, demanded that the language be granted classical status by 17 February.
As per news reports, Reddy told Desai that both Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah were in favour of the request and a decision regarding it would be taken soon.
Desai insisted that if the Centre is in favour then no other day can be better than 27 February, which is celebrated as Marathi Bhasha Gaurav Din (Pride of Marathi Day).
The Maharashtra government earlier dispatched 6,000 postcards, in addition to 1.2 lakh postcards sent earlier, to President Ram Nath Kovind seeking classical language status to Marathi.
He noted that the state government had formed a committee chaired by litterateur Rangnath Pathare who had prepared a voluminous report citing evidence about the ancientness of the language, originality and continuity and literary traditions for the criteria for granting classical language status to a language.
He said though the Centre had taken the decision in 2004 to confer the “classical language” status to various languages, Marathi has been ignored despite repeated demands.
A high-level committee of language experts appointed by the Centre had unanimously approved a proposal to this effect seven years ago, but there has been no further progress in the matter, Desai said.
In 2020, the Maharashtra Legislature passed a unanimous resolution recommending to the Centre to accord the “classical language” status to Marathi in 2020.
What is a classical language, how does a language receive this distinction and what benefits does it get from the classification, let’s find out:
What is a classical language in India, and how is it classified
At present, there are six Indian languages that have been classified as ‘classical’: Tamil was the first language to be declared classical in 2004, followed by Sanskrit in 2005, Kannada and Telugu in 2008, Malayalam in 2013 and Odia in 2014.
The Ministry of Culture has defined a set of guidelines to declare a language as classical.
A language is declared classical if it fulfills the following criteria as provided by the culture ministry in the Rajya Sabha in February 2014:
“(i) High antiquity of its early texts/recorded history over a period of 1500-2000 years;
(ii) A body of ancient literature/texts, which is considered a valuable heritage by generations of speakers;
(iii) The literary tradition be original and not borrowed from another speech community;
(iv) The classical language and literature being distinct from modern, there may also be a discontinuity between the classical language and its later forms or its offshoots.”
To sum it up, a language can be classified as classical if it has an independent and original literary tradition and a large body of ancient literature.
How do classical languages benefit
In July 2014, the Human Resource and Development Ministry responded to a question in the Lok Sabha on the benefits it provides a language that has been notified as a Classical language.
The ministry establishes two major annual international awards for scholars of eminence in classical Indian languages.
A Centre of Excellence for studies in Classical Languages is set up once a language is declared as classical.
“The University Grants Commission is requested to create, to start with at least in the Central Universities, a certain number of Professional Chairs for the Classical Languages so declared,” it said.
The Ministry of Culture has so far opened Central Institute of Classical Tamil (CICT) in Chennai for Tamil and four institutes for Sanskrit: Rashtriya Sanskrit Sansthan, New Delhi; Maharishi Sandipani Rashtriya Ved Vidya Pratishthan, Ujjain; Rashtriya Sanskrit Vidyapeetha, Tirupati; and Sri Lal Bahadur Shastri Rashtriya Sanskrit Vidyapeeth, New Delhi.
The HRD ministry established three Centres of Excellence for Studies at the Central Institute of Indian Languages (CIIL) for Telugu, Kannada and Odia.
As per Indian Express, the University Grant Commission (UGC) also awards research projects for promoting these languages. The UGC released funds worth INR 56.74 lakh in 2016-17 and INR 95.67 lakh in 2017-18, the Ministry of Culture said.
With inputs from agencies
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