NCERT changes English medium book titles to Hindi words, triggers row 

The book titles have been named after Indian music instruments and classical ragas, creating a debate among netizens besides raising concerns about language imposition

Hyderabad: Breaking the long tradition of giving the textbook titles with the language of the instruction, the National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT) gave Hindi names in Roman script to several of its new English-medium textbooks, including English textbooks.

The book titles have been named after Indian music instruments and classical ragas, creating a debate among netizens besides raising concerns about language imposition.

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For instance, the Class VI English textbook, earlier called Honeysuckle, has been renamed as ‘Poorvi’, a Hindi word meaning ‘eastern’ and is also the name of a classical music saga. Similarly, textbooks of English for Class I and II students have been named as ‘Mridang’, a musical instrument widely used in India. In the case of Class III, the English textbook is now called ‘Santoor’, another musical instrument.

Not just the language, the NCERT has also changed names of the Class VI mathematics title. While the mathematics textbook was called Mathematics in English, ‘Ganit’ in Hindi and ‘Riyazi’ in Urdu medium, the book title has now been changed to ‘Ganita Prakash’ for both English and Hindi versions.

These changes come at a time when the southern states, particularly Tamil Nadu, have been strongly opposing the Central government move to impose a three language policy in school education. These states have termed the move as imposition of Hindi on non-Hindi speaking people.

Reacting to the debate on Reddit one user posted a comment saying “perfect example of Hindi imposition”, while another user said, “Why can’t they stay without meddling in other languages”.

A few Reddit users felt that the decision to rename books was unnecessary, ignorant and that it would backfire and asked how kids would be able to recollect book titles, which are alien to them. “Unnecessary and ignorant. How would a child relate with a textbook with a name that is alien to them”.

Another user said “School’s gonna be a joke soon. Kids will have to actually understand pedagogical nuances and depend on their logic to learn things. It’s going to backfire on these people, because there will be less people parroting authority (which is what they want)”.