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Asam Sahitya Sabha to blacken signboards

By The Assam Tribune

GUWAHATI, April 8 (PTI): Assam's premier literary organisation, Asam Sahitya Sabha, has directed its district units to paint all public signboards black if they were not written in the official state language by the forthcoming Rongali Bihu festival.

"We have time and again urged the state government and public organisations to ensure that signboards, notices and official records and correspondences were done in either Assamese or the predominant local language," Sabha General Secretary Paramanda Rajbongshi told PTI here today.

The Sabha, he said, has presented several suggestions to the government in this regard, but if it fails to cooperate, the Sabha would be compelled to blacken all signboards during Bihu.

The Sabha has also demanded creation of a separate directorate, to declare Bodo as an associate official language, to give importance to the particular indigenous language in the autonomous council areas where Assamese would be the second language and 50 per cent marks in the mother tongue language should be made mandatory in appointments to all government and non-government jobs.

Rajbongshi clarified that they were not against English as a medium per se but was committed to the promotion of the mother tongue as it was a part of the United Nations and the centre''s education policy.

"Our demand is to make the mother tongue first, state language the second, national language the third and English, the fourth language for medium of instruction and official purpose", he added.

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