In News
- The Indian Council for Cultural Relations (ICCR) has envisaged a special project called The Language Friendship Bridge.
Language Friendship Bridge
- About:
- ICCR will create a pool of experts in 10 languages from some neighbouring countries and others who share a cultural heritage with India.
- Objective:
- India plans to expand its cultural footprint in nations with whom it has historical ties, including those in its immediate neighbourhood.
- Countries:
- Myanmar, Sri Lanka, Uzbekistan and Indonesia to facilitate better people-to-people exchanges.
- Languages:
- Kazakh, Uzbek, Bhutanese, Ghoti (spoken in Tibet), Burmese, Khmer (spoken in Cambodia), Thai, Sinhalese and Bahasa (spoken in both Indonesia and Malaysia).
- Implementation:
- ICCR plans to train five to 10 people in the official languages of these countries and plans to roll out the project by this year.
- University consultations:
- ICCR is in discussion with universities and institutes as well as experts offering foreign language courses in the country on the modalities of implementing the project.
- Two possibilities to rollout the project:
- One is to institute tie-ups wherein teachers from these countries come and teach courses in India.
- The second approach is ICCR offering scholarships to Indian students to go and study these languages in the countries where they are spoken.
Need & Significance for the Project
- In India, the language learning focus till now has been on European languages like Spanish, French and German, along with the languages of major Asian economies like China and Japan.
- India requires translators, interpreters and teachers in the languages of the countries with whom it shares a cultural history.
- A large number of people are visiting India for treatment from countries like Turkey, Bangladesh, Afghanistan and Maldives and there is an urgent need for a pool of translators and interpreters for facilitating their visits as well.
- With India seeing a boom in cultural and economic ties with other neighbouring countries the move was needed and experts also feel that the ICCR’s list of languages needs to be expanded.
|
Indian Council for Cultural Relations (ICCR)
|
