A delegation, led by Jnanpith recipient Chandrashekar Kambar, will call on President Pranab Mukherjee on February 21, which is observed as International Mother Language Day, to submit a memorandum on the necessity of imparting primary education in the mother tongue.
He announced this at a function on Saturday to distribute prizes to students, who secured the highest marks in SSLC and PUC by writing examinations in Kannada. Prof. Kambar had earlier initiated an online petition to Prime Minister Narendra Modi saying the country’s education system needs to make “a judicious use of mother tongue-based bilingualism”, without reducing the medium of instruction debate into a “native language vs. English” issue.
Good examples
Chief Minister Siddaramaiah said Bharat Ratna recipients such as Sir M. Visvesvaraya and C.N.R. Rao had studied primary education in Kannada medium and excelled in their fields. It was a wrong impression among parents that their wards would perform poorly in their careers if they study primary education in Kannada medium, he said.
Cash prizes, a wrist watch, a certificate and a bag were given to 357 students of Bengaluru division, who secured highest marks in 10th and 12th standard examinations held last April.
