There have been demands for more autonomy in the functioning of the special centres for the promotion of Classical Languages Telugu, Kannada, Malayalam and Odia.
Centres for Classical Languages
- Once a language is notified as a classical language, the Education Ministry is required to set up a Centre of Excellence for Studies for the said classical language.
- Center for Classical Languages Status: India has six classical languages viz. Tamil (2004), Sanskrit (2005), Kannada (2008), Telugu (2008), Malayalam (2013), and Odia (2014).
- The Centre for Telugu, Kannada, Malayalam, and Odia function under the aegis of the Central Institute of Indian Languages (CIIL), Mysuru.
- The Centre for Tamil is autonomous and is named Central Institute of Classical Tamil (CICT).
- Sanskrit is promoted through three Central Universities.
Reasons For the Demand for Autonomy
- Funding Crunch: The centers face financial crunch which hampers its organising capability as any event or activity planned has to be sanctioned by the CIIL before.
- The Project Director of the center has no financial drawing power and has to take approval from the Director of CIIL.
- High vacancy: The absence of regular funds results in vacancies in many positions for research scholars as well as administrative staff.
- Example: Centre of Excellence for Studies in Classical Telugu (Andhra Pradesh) have only 12 staff out of 36 approved
- Prioritisation: The focus of the central government is unequivocally towards the promotion of Sanskrit with a budget of ₹643.84 crore spent between 2017-18 and 2019-20, whereas only ₹29 crore was spent on other five classical Indian languages
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Classical Languages
- A classical language is one that has its own literature and a significant and ancient corpus of written script.
- All the Classical Languages are listed in the Eighth Schedule of the Constitution.
- Criteria for designating the Classical Language Status: The Ministry of Culture offers rules that must be followed in order to be classified as a classical language in India.
- Ancient Origin: High antiquity of its early texts/recorded history over a period of 1,500-2,000 years.
- Literary Heritage: Contain a body of ancient literature or texts that is considered a valuable heritage by generations of speakers.
- Originality: The literary tradition should be original and not borrowed from another speech community.
- Discontinuity from Modern Avatars: The said language and literature should be distinct from its modern format with a marked discontinuity between the classical language and its later forms or its offshoots.
- Benefits of the Special Status: Once a language is notified as a classical language, certain benefits are provided by the Education Ministry to promote it,
- The HRD ministry conducts 2 major annual international awards for scholars of eminence in the said languages.
- A centre of excellence for studies in the classical language is set up.
- University Grants Commission is requested to create a certain number of Professional Chairs in Central universities for the languages that get the classical tag.
- The University Grant Commission (UGC) also awards research projects for promoting these languages.
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