THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan on Thursday inaugurated the Goethe-Zentrum in Thiruvananthapuram to house Germany’s language centre and the office of the Honorary Consul. Speaking after inaugurating the new building at Jawahar Nagar, Pinarayi said the relationship between Kerala and Germany dated back to the 19th century with the arrival of the Basel Mission in Kozhikode. It contributed significantly towards the progress of the Malabar in areas of education, industry and social transformation.
He also recalled the contributions of German missionary Hermann Gundert, who combined the Malayalam grammar book ‘Malayalabhaasha Vyakaranam’.
With the signing of the Triple Win Agreement between India and the German Federal Employment Agency in December 2021 to recruit 1,500 nurses from Kerala, Goethe-Zentrum has become the official partner providing German language training to candidates.
The chief minister also expressed pleasure over the fact that 30,000 candidates wrote the Goethe-Certificate exams at Thiruvananthapuram and Kochi centres. Thus, Kerala has become the pioneer in India to partner directly with Germany for fair and ethically correct migration of human resources.
He also recalled the visit of German Federal Minister of Labour Hubertus Heil to the capital in July and the discussions he had with the state government on expanding the ties.
H E Achim Burkart, German Consul General and Regional Director of the Goethe-Institut (South Asia), MP Shashi Tharoor, Chief Secretary Dr Venu V, Mayor Arya Rajendran, MLA V K Prasanth, Chief South Asia Region Director of the Goethe-Institut, Marla Stukenberg; Honorary Consul and Director of Goethe-Zentrum Trivandrum and Kochi Syed Ibrahim and Jison John, MD and CEO of Allianz Services India, who helped the Zentrum to construct its building, also attended the inaugural ceremony.
GOETHE-ZENTRUM
Part of the worldwide network of Goethe-Institut, the official language and cultural institute of Germany, the Zentrum, has been functioning in the city for 15 years now. It is managed by the Indo-German Language and Cultural Society under the Chairmanship of former Kerala Planning Board Member G Vijaya Raghavan. Starting with roughly 400 students in Kerala, it now enrols more than 5,600 students yearly