Everyone living in Karnataka must learn Kannada: CM
BENGALURU:Karnataka chief minister Siddaramaiah on Wednesday urged all those living in the state to learn Kannada and make their children do so as well and declared that not learning the language was “a disrespect to this land”.
“Every person who lives in the state is a Kannadiga. Every person who resides here should learn the language, respect it, and make their children learn it,” Siddaramaiah said at an event here to mark the 61st Kannada Rajyotsava or the state formation day.
The Karnataka government has over the past year introduced a slew of measures — mandatory learning of Kannada in all schools and removing Hindi from signboards at the Metro rail stations — through which it has attempted to burnish its proKannada credentials.
There have been other proposals that have attracted controversy like the formation of a committee to study the legality of having an official state flag and 100% reservations for locals in blue-collar private sector jobs.
An unfazed Siddaramaiah said it was the duty of all those who live in the state to create an environment where everybody feels the urge to learn Kannada. “Every person here must feel that they are Kannadiga first and then Indian,” he said.
Referring to the Supreme Court’s verdict in 2014 which struck down a 1994 Karnataka law making it mandatory for primary schools to teach in Kannada, Siddarmaiah said he had sought the support of all other chief ministers against this.
“I tried to tell them this was a question of regional languages of the country. I even wrote seven times to the PM but did not get any response,” he said.
Siddaramaiah said there was a trend among parents to make their children study in Englishmedium schools. “This is not a good development. Our understanding deepens if we learn in our mother tongue,” he said.
The CM said the government had decided to try to create awareness among parents to make them respect Kannada. “We want to create an environment where parents feel like sending their children to Kannada-medium schools...” he said.