GUWAHATI, Feb 25 - Terming the State Government as the �murderer� of mother languages of Assam, the Asam Sahitya Sabha today said that the Government must take effective measures to ensure protection and preservation of all the mother languages in the State.
The Sabha also announced a Statewide massive awareness campaign among the masses to pressurize the Government into taking steps for protection and safeguard to the mother and indigenous languages.
�The Assam government has been busy with the agenda of glorifying the Hindutva ideology of the BJP and has completely neglected the issues concerning our mother language and all the indigenous languages of Assam,� Sabha president Dr Paramananda Rajbongshi told the media at a gathering of eminent citizens on the occasion of International Mother Language Day here today.
Coming down heavily on the State Government and the corporate sector for their apathetic attitude towards the mother language and indigenous languages, Dr Rajbongshi said that the Sabha had been demanding for long to implement region-wise the relevant Acts on the Assamese language and other indigenous tongues.
�But the State Government and the corporate sector�s unabated stress has been only on English and Hindi language, leading to marginalization of mother languages and indigenous languages. The earlier Congress Government and the current BJP Government in Assam are equally responsible for this crisis,� he said.
On August 7 last year, the Sabha had along with the delegations from all the State-level indigenous and ethnic language-literature organizations of Assam, jointly met the Special Language Committee of the Government, and the outcome of the meeting was to announce immediately a language policy by the Government. In last January also, the Sabha and the aforesaid delegations had in the presence of State Chief Secretary and other senior bureaucrats requested the Chief Minister to announce and implement the proposed language policy.
�The Chief Minister had assured us of immediate action by the Government in this regard. Very recently, we once again requested the Chief Minister through his Media Adviser Hrishikesh Goswami to announce the language policy on the occasion of International Mother Language Day. But there is absolutely no response from the Government,� he added.
