MISGUIDED BY anti-English zealotry for over half a century, the Sri Lankans have now finally realised what they had been missing, the opportunity to bring in business to their shores through the use of that very language. Their reaction was typical. When a colonial power grants its colony political freedom, the subject country over-reacts to everything colonial and gets rid of its last vestiges, lock, stock and barrel.
Thus, Sri Lanka did away with English in 1956. Sinhalese, they thought, would suffice for their national and international needs. But they were mistaken. Now the realisation has dawned on them that they need the English language to survive in the modern corporate sector. They have asked for India’s help to teach young Sri Lankans, aged 18-24, the use of English as a life skill.
India has risen to the occasion and started aiding the island nation in their desperate quest. The government’s target is to train at least 50,000 people in the use of the language in a short period of time. The Indian high commission and the English and Foreign Languages University (EFLU) in Hyderabad have got involved in this.
The Sri Lankans have watched with envy how India has become the number one business process outsourcing (BPO) centre in the world, attracting business outsourcing from America, Britain and other commercial capitals of the world. Here we have intelligent, skilled, linguistically proficient manpower to meet the needs of the entire world. The Chinese are our competitors but they lag behind us because their pronunciation isn’t easy to catch.
This teaching programme aims at ‘teaching the teacher’. According to an estimate, there are nearly 25,000 potential English teachers in Lanka. The EFLU will help set up a similar institute there to train these teachers. The Indian government is offering a number of scholarships to them to come over to Hyderabad for a three-months crash course in English for professional use.
All this massive effort looks like ’too little too late’. Language skills cannot be picked up and perfected overnight. It needs constant nurturing from early childhood up, until mature adulthood and even later. The nuances of the language will be lost to the crash student. Fine-tuning is necessary to perfect language skills.
Although some language fanatics have occasionally demanded scraping English, particularly at the primary school level here in India, largely our government and educational authorities have been sensible enough to retain the teaching of it right from the start. The mushroom growth of English medium schools across our vast country is a clear indication of parents’ preferences.
To survive in today’s cut-throat world of commerce and IT, we need English. The Sri Lankans have realised it at this point of time. The Taiwanese too have started a huge effort to promote the language, not only for BPO purposes but also for their survival through tourism.
Let us give our southern neighbours all the support we can. Let us teach them all we can. In this global village, our survival is interdependent. A common language – English – will largely ensure our common survival.
4.18 / 11 votes 
