Mysore/Mysuru: Moving a step ahead towards the successful implementation of NEP-2020 in terms of promotion of regional languages in schools, Navodaya Vidyalaya Samiti                                                                 (NVS) has collaborated with National Testing Service-India (NTS-I) under Central Institute of Indian Languages (CIIL), Mysuru, for training NVS language teachers by offering a six-day online capacity building programme for each language. 

NVS in collaboration with CIIL wishes to run this programme for 14 languages in total. In this connection, capacity-building programmes for 4 languages — Kannada, Marathi, Malayalam and Telugu — will be conducted in January and February 2021. 

Prof. C. G. Venkatesha Murthy, Director, CIIL, said that CIIL is fully equipped to impart training and committed for the protection, preservation, and promotion of all Indian languages irrespective of their socio-linguistic status. 

Vinayak Garg, Commissioner, NVS, opined that language teachers will prove to be the backbone in the successful implementation of NEP-2020.                                                           

 He further said that such programmes along with their training modules shall be made available through Government portals such as DIKSHA, SWAYAM and NIOS for the larger benefit of the teaching community and public. 

He emphasised that students must be able to inculcate LSRW skills in their own mother tongues and regional languages as native languages are very important for the better cognitive development of an individual. 

He added that teaching of regional languages to non-native speakers is one of the very important pillars of ‘Ek Bharat Shresht Bharat’ as it will help strengthening unity and integrity in a country like India which has one of the  highest linguistic diversity in the world. 

Prof. P.R. Dharmesh Ferna-ndez, Head, Centre for Testing and Evaluation, briefed the participants about the activities undertaken by CIIL and its 7 regional centres located across the country. He also gave a detailed description of CIIL’s major schemes and projects such as NTS-I, NTM, BVP, LDCIL, SPPEL, and centres for studies on classical languages.   

Expert’s lectures and sessions in the programmes will be delivered by the renowned scholars across the country.  About 350 TGTs will get trained with the state-of-the-art techniques, methods, tools and technologies in the area of language education, assessment and evaluation.  

Dr. Pankaj Dwivedi, Officer In-charge of NTS-I, CIIL, is programme coordinator of these training programmes. Gyanendra Kumar and Gopal Krishna (NVS, Deputy Commissioners) and Mohammed Aziz (Navodaya Leadership Institute, Rangareddy) are supervising overall logistics of the programmes. Dr. Rakesh Cherucode (SRLC, CIIL) and  Sujata Bhujang (WRLC, CIIL) are extending their academic support for the programme organised under the patronage of Director, CIIL Mysore and Commissioner, NVS (HQ).