Chennai: Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan, who had earlier opened a Pandora’s Box by issuing a threat to not release funds for the State, urged Chief Minister M K Stalin ‘to not politicize education and rise above political differences in the best interest of our students,’ assuring that the BJP Union government was committed ‘to promote and popularize the eternal Tamil culture and language globally.’ In a letter to the Chief Minister on Friday, Pradhan said it was inappropriate for the State to view the NEP (National Education Policy 2020) with a myopic vision and spin progressive educational reforms into threats to sustain their political narratives and made it clear that it did not advocate the promotion of any language. Repeating his threat of not releasing funds, running close to Rs 5000 crore due to the State until NEP was implemented, albeit in a veiled fashion on Friday, the Union Minister said, ‘The continued opposition to NEP 2020 for political reasons deprived students, teachers and educational institutions in Tamil Nadu of the immense opportunities and resources that this policy offers.’ Defending the NEP, he said that it had been designed to be flexible, allowing States to customize their implementation to suit their unique educational needs, he said centrally-supported programmes such as Samagra Shiksha were aligned with it and PM SHRI schools had been conceptualized to be NEP exemplar schools, perhaps justifying the non-release of funds for the two schemes. Requesting Stalin to rise above political differences and look into the matter holistically keeping in mind the interest of young learners, Pradhan said unequivocally that there was no question of imposing any language on any State or community as the NEP upheld the principle of linguistic freedom and ensured that students continued to learn in the language of their choice. However, he described the three-language policy as a ‘the backbone of India’s education framework since 1968, regretting that it was never implemented in letter and spirit, leading to a decline in systematic teaching of Indian languages in schools and an over-reliance on foreign languages, limiting students to their linguistic roots, which, he said was a ‘historic oversight’ that the NEP sought to correct. Pradhan mentioned the various things done by Prime Minister Narendra Modi for the development of Tamil like the setting up of the Thiruvalluvar Cultural Centre in Singapore and said that Stalin’s letter to him on the current controversy was not in good spirit. However leaders of other political parties in the State opposed the NEP and also flayed Pradhan for threatening to not release Rs 5000 crore due to the State. Leader of the Opposition Edappadi K Palaiswami said the NEP had some elements that would affect the State’s successful education system. In a statement Palaniswami said that the attempt to thrust the three-language policy on the State and the warning that the State would lose Rs 5000 crore if the NEP was not implemented had created fear and confusion in the minds of the people. TNCC president K Selvaperunthogai flayed the Union Government for holding back Rs 2152 crore meant for the SSA and Rs 5000 crore for the PM SHRI schools and said the BJP had done nothing for Tamil, as Pradhan had claimed, and said that it was during Congress rule Tamil was accorded the Classical Language status. The BJP government from 2017 and 2022 had spent only Rs 22.94 crore for the development of Tamil while spending Rs 1074 crore for developing Sanskrit, a language spoken by 18,500 people, he said, adding that Tamil Nadu would not accept the three-language policy, he said.
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