Gaffe on Tamil antiquity in textbook will be righted: Minister

Minister for School Education K A Sengottaiyan Saturday said the reference to Tamil as only 2,300 years old in the 12th class textbook was a mistake and assured that steps have been taken to correct it.

A day after DMK president M K Stalin slammed the government over alleged prominence given to Sanskrit over Tamil in a school textbook, the Minister said as soon as the matter came to the government's notice, steps were taken to correct it and action directed against those responsible for it.

School headmasters have also been asked to make appropriate corrections, he said adding that officials have been asked to ensure such mistakes were not repeated.

"Tamil is the oldest language," he added.

On Friday, Stalin, who is also the leader of the opposition in the Assembly referred to the English textbook and claimed it had a reference saying that Tamil was 2,300 years old and Sanskrit 4,000 years.

Asking how this could be tolerated, he had said in a tweet, "such a thing will only happen in a regime that has smeared itself with saffron hue, is this Tamil Nadu government or Sanskrit sarkar.