Four Indian universities to introduce tribal language courses

Four universities in India, including Delhi University, will introduce tribal language courses from Jan 26 next year, Tripura governor Padmanabha Balakrishna Acharya said Tuesday.

"Four prominent universities in India would each introduce a chair for an important personality of northeast India to launch courses in tribal languages," Governor Acharya told reporters at Raj Bhavan here.

"Initially, certificate course would be introduced from Jan 26 (next year) and subsequently diploma, degree and post graduate courses on tribal languages would be started," said Acharya, who is Nagaland governor and is holding additional charge of Tripura.

The four universities which would introduce the tribal language courses are: Mumbai's Smt Nathibai Damodar Thackersey (SNDT) Women's University; Mumbai University; Delhi University and Karnataka University.

SNDT University is the first women's university in southeast Asia.

"Both tribals and non-tribals would be eligible to learn tribal languages in these universities. If foreign languages can be taught in several Indian universities, why are not the languages of Indian tribals in the academic curriculum of higher educational institutions," he asked.

The governor was on a tour of the US Oct 24-Nov 4. During this visit, he met Indians, especially the tribals of northeast India, in different cities of America.

He said he invited the important dignitaries of the Indian American Community, National Council of American Indians and International Center for Cultural Studies (ICCS) in the US to visit Nagaland to witness the state's biggest festival - Hornbill Festival - during the first week of December.