Revival rage

The government is promoting the ancient language as the voice of India’s soul

- Shalini Singh

At a time when food habits, exercise routines, roman-tic relationships and differing ideologies are in the news for one reason or another, could language be left behind? A row broke out recently in the Uttar Pradesh assembly, where 13 MLAs took their oath in Sanskrit. Two others who took their oath in Urdu were, however, asked to retake it in Hindi. According to the 2001 census, more than 14,000 Indians had Sanskrit as their mother tongue. While it is one of the 22 Indian languages listed in the Eighth Schedule of the Constitution, it is viewed as a language of religious rituals and discourse, and is barely spoken today.

But that is likely to change now. After Narendra Modi came to power three years ago, the government declared a National Sanskrit Week to promote the language in schools. In March, the BJP government in Assam decided to make Sanskrit compulsory in all state board schools up to class 8. Those keen to promote the language as a gateway to India’s ancient culture welcomed the move. Others were perplexed: was it part of a saffronisation agenda?

In 2015, the human resource development ministry set up a fresh committee (after the previous one, formed in 2014, failed to submit its report in time) to recommend a tenyear roadmap for the promotion of Sanskrit. The 12-member committee was led by former chief election commissioner N. Gopalaswami. The committee submitted a 32-page report in early 2016 in which it defines Sanskrit as the “voice of India’s soul and wisdom”. The committee has suggested that Sanskrit be promoted by making qualitative changes in the education, by integrating the language in other disciplines like maths, chemistry and physics, and by finding tools to modernise its dissemination.