BENGALURU: The decision of the state government to introduce Kannada as a mandatory subject in higher education from the current academic year has received a mixed response from students from outside Karnataka and the country studying in the city.
In a recent meeting, the Karnataka State Council for Higher Education decided to introduce Kannada as a mandatory subject in both general and professional degree courses. Express contacted students, who do not speak the language, to understand how this will affect their studies.
Conversations with a few students from the Garden City College, revealed that not all of them are comfortable with the introduction of such a rule. “What will I do with a certificate in Kannada after going back home?” asks Sheroon, a Sri Lankan, pursuing her BA in Journalism.
Students like Sheroon and Ruveesha (also from Sri Lanka) assert that they do not intend to pursue their post-graduate studies in India and thus find learning a new language unnecessary.
Jean, a first-year BA student from Africa, said he would be interested in taking Kannada as a “supplementary and not as a part of the main syllabus”.
Mrinmoyee from Kolkata, a first-year BSc student, says, “The shopkeepers around my residence know or at least understand Hindi, which is enough for day-to-day communication.”
Rounak and Bhupan, B.Com students from Assam and Tripura, respectively, also gave the same reasons and said they have managed to live in the city for two years without learning Kannada.
Akansha, a BBM student from Jharkhand, was of the opinion that “communication would be easier” if Kannada was introduced as a subject. She said that if students knew at least the basics of the language, then accomplishing many things would become easier. She, however, did not want this affecting her degree results.
Priyamvada from Orissa said she “wouldn’t pass” if Kannada was made compulsory which would, in turn, affect her final results. A few other students also agreed with her saying they would not have come to the city to obtain degrees if they knew they had to compulsorily study a new language.
“When a few students are struggling to speak fluent English, learning a new language would only be a hassle,” says Prakriti from Chhattisgarh. She says she cannot disagree with the introduction of Kannada as a compulsory subject, but the freedom to choose to study should be given to every student.