Mysuru: Days after the draft version of the National Education Policy (NEP) 2019 caused a massive uproar for making the study of Hindi mandatory in non-Hindi speaking States, the Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD) has released a revised draft, removing the requirement. The revision to the draft comes after politicians and citizen slammed the draft for imposing Hindi upon States, in an alleged attempt to ‘homogenise’ the diverse linguistic fabric country.

The revised draft states, “In keeping with the principle of flexibility, students who wish to change one or more of the three languages they are studying may do so in Grade 6 or Grade 7, so long as they are able to still demonstrate proficiency in three languages (one language at the literature level) in their modular Board Examinations some time during secondary school).”

The revised draft does not mandate which specific languages students must study in middle school. However, the revised draft still advocates for the three-language formula, stating that it needs to be ‘implemented in its spirit throughout the country, promoting multilingual communicative abilities for a multilingual country.’

The original draft stated, “In keeping with the principle of flexibility, students who wish to change one of the three languages they are studying may do so in Grade 6, so long as the study of three languages by students in the Hindi-speaking States would continue to include Hindi and English and one of the modern Indian languages from other parts of India, while the study of languages by students in the non-Hindi-speaking States would include the regional language, Hindi and English.”

The original draft required students from non-Hindi speaking States to study Hindi and English in addition to their regional language.