Lexicographer G. Venkatasubbaiah has said that the State government should make teaching of Kannada compulsory from class 1 to 10 in the State.
He was speaking at a function organised by the Academy of General Education, Rashtrakavi Govinda Pai Research Centre and MGM College, in which he was felicitated here on Saturday. He presented the annual “Kadengodlu Kavya Prashasti” to poet M.S. Rudreshwara Swamy from Bangalore.
Prof. Venkatasubbaiah said that such a move would also enable migrants from other States to learn Kannada. While it was difficult for adults to learn Kannada, the children of migrants should be taught the language. The fear in some quarters that Kannada as a language would die was misplaced as Kannada ranked 30th among the 10,000 languages in the world. While the people in Bangalore used a lot of English words while conversing in Kannada, the case was different in rural areas where Kannada still flourished.
Chief Minister Jagadish Shettar had promised to back Kannada Sahitya Parishat to revive the Kannada-Kannada dictionary project, which had been discontinued a few decades ago. It was necessary to have a good Kannada-English dictionary in circulation. , Prof. Venkatasubbaiah said.
