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Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalayas (Modern Schools) and Hindi Imposition

Thanjai Nalankilli

TAMIL TRIBUNE, February 2010 (ID. 2010-02-01)
This article is archived at: http://www.tamiltribune.com/10/0201.html

OUTLINE

Abbreviations

1. What are Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalayas?

2. Whose Money is Funding These Navodaya Vidyalayas?

3. A Fable about Two Brothers and Chicken Curry

4. What is the Fair Thing to Do?

ABBREVIATIONS

AIADMK - All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam

CBSE - Central Board of Secondary Education

DMK - Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam

1. What are Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalayas?

On September 30, 2009, Indian Government Human Resource Development Minister Kapil Sibal asked Tamil Nadu State Government to open Navodaya Vidyalayas (Modern Schools) in the state "to give high quality education to rural students". He added that Indian government plans to expand these Indian government funded Navodaya Vidyalayas (Modern Schools).

In 1986, Indian Government, in further intrusion into the education field, started Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalayas (Modern Schools) all over India. These are co-educational, residential schools, fully financed by Government of India and run by an autonomous organization, Navodaya Vidyalaya Samiti, under the Ministry of Human Resource Development. Because of the generous funding from the central government, these schools have better facilities than state government funded schools which are short on funds because most of the taxes paid by the people of the state go to the central government. All states except Tamil Nadu allowed the central government to open such schools and got funding for the schools. Why did Tamilnadu refuse to open these schools? Hindi is a compulsory subject in these schools and it is against the policy of Tamil Nadu government. Tamilnadu government wanted Hindi teaching removed in order to function in the state and the Indian government refused. From time to time the Indian government had asked Tamil Nadu government to allow these schools, and the state government, irrespective of which party was in power (DMK or AIADMK) or who was the chief minister (M. Karunanidhi, M. G. Ramachandran or J. Jeyalalithaa) refused. Indian Government Human Resource Development Minister Kapil Sibal's request in September 2009 is just another one of these requests to bring more schools into Tamil Nadu that teach Hindi.

What Mr. Sibal said is true. These schools do provide high quality education to rural students completely free. So Tamil Nadu is missing out on this. Indian government has given Tamil Nadu the devil's choice: Accept compulsory Hindi or lose funding for modern schools.

2. Whose Money is Funding These Navodaya Vidyalayas?

Whose money is funding these modern schools? It is not Hindi states' tax monies that are used for these schools. Then they would have the right to say if you want our money for the schools, you should teach Hindi. It is the Indian government taxes, paid by Hindi and non-Hindi peoples, that is funding these schools. (To put it in proper perspective, over 75% of the taxes are paid by non-Hindi speakers. Over 10% of the taxes are paid by Tamil Nadu.) Yet Hindi politicians say to us, "If you want part of your money back to establish high quality schools in your states, you must thrust our language into the throats of your children." This is unfair, this is unjust.

3. A Fable about Two Brothers and Chicken Curry

Let me tell you a fable or a story. There were two brothers and their families who lived together as a single household. The older brother had 3 children while the younger had only two. So the older brother's family outnumbered that of the younger one. Younger brother's family was vegetarian while the older brother and his family ate meat. When it came to lunch and dinner, the older brother made sure it was rice and meat curry. The younger brother asked for a vegetable curry too so everyone can have rice and curry. He was outvoted. Democratic imperialism! (I think I have coined a new phrase to depict Hindi rule over India.) Younger brother's family had to eat just boiled rice with some salt while older brother's family had sumptuous meals of rice and meat. Although the younger brother's earning went into household funds he could not benefit fully from it. The same is happening here in "democratic" India. Although it is with our taxes that these schools are funded we cannot have those funds unless we are willing to study their language Hindi.

4. What is the Fair Thing to Do?

What is the fair thing to do? Indian central government should give our state's share of Navodaya Vidyalaya funds (now unused) to the state government education department as a grant. It is OUR share of money which we paid to the central government as taxes. It is not Hindi speakers' money. The state government then shall use those funds for educational purposes (more computers in schools, better teacher salaries, etc.). That is the fair thing to do. But when was "fairness" part of Indian government's official language policy?

Let us face it. Hindi will be thrust into our throats, splashed on to our faces, pumped into our ears one way or other as long as Tamil Nadu is part of India. Know it. Accept it.

A December 1, 2009 news report by Express News Service (India) entitled "Lankan Government Acquiring Lands in Tamil Areas" alarmed me and should be of concern to all who hope for a fair and equitable solution to the ethnic conflict between the majority Sinhalese (who control the government) and the minority Tamils.

The news report says that the Sri Lankan Government is buying land from Tamil people in the northeast and is inviting foreign investors to introduce high-yielding advanced agricultural techniques to produce food crops. It is not clear if the government would own the land and grows crops with foreign investment or would sell the land to foreign investors. In any case large areas of cultivatable land would be purchased from Tamils. Almost all the Tamil landowners were at the time of the news report in crowded IDP camps or elsewhere away from their homes and land (IDP - Internally Displaced Persons).

This is the wrong time to buy land from Tamils. The cultivatable lands, once their source of work and income, are at present un-cultivatable due to landmines and war damage (artillery shelling and aerial bombing). Their home in these lands are also totally destroyed or severely damaged. Most of them have no work or no source of income. To buy land from these people at this time is a predatory act. That the government would rush to buy land even before these people are resettled in their villages is cause for concern.

Large number of Tamil people would become landless hired farm laborers in their former land. Or they would migrate to larger towns and cities looking for jobs never to return back to their villages because they have nothing to return to. This aids the Sri Lankan Government plan to disperse the Tamil people from their traditional areas (northeast) to all over the island. Even those who remain as hired farm laborers would not own the land but the government or foreign investors would own them. Tamil people would be at the mercy of the new landlords.

The new land owners (government or foreign investors) may cultivate high-yield crops and produce more food but the original landowners, now reduced to hired farm labourers, may not even be able to buy enough food to feed their families.

Let me put it another way. The original landowners (the Tamils) will not benefit from the introduction of "high-yielding advanced agricultural techniques to produce food crops" and would not be able to taste the fruits of their ancestral lands.

The Sri Lankan Government plan is against the interest of Tamil people, and is yet another way of "weakening" the Tamil people.

If the Sri Lankan Government really wants to develop the farming sector in the northeast and at the same time help the Tamil people there prosper, I suggest the following action or a suitable variation developed by experts.

Sri Lankan Government should immediately return all the purchased land to original owners. Landowners should be allowed to pay back the payment received in small installments at low interest rate. This is the equitable thing to do.

Until landmines are cleared and the farmlands rendered cultivatable, the Sri Lankan Government should create jobs for the people in their respective villages and towns by paying them to rebuild their own homes and also local roads, schools and hospitals. I am sure that many foreign governments would gladly fund such projects provided there is transparency, accountability and access to international observers to visit the areas under reconstruction and talk to local people without government agents observing every move and conversation. [We thank the many western democracies that suspended or curtailed financial aid after the war because of lack of transparency and accountability. We request them to continue to do so until government "secrecy" is lifted and foreign governments and non-government organizations (NGO) have access to the war ravaged areas and people. Otherwise foreign aid would be diverted for building military installation and for buying land from Tamil people.]

When farm lands are ready for cultivation, invite foreign experts to train local people the new methods of high-yielding agricultural techniques. If large tracts of lands are necessary for these new techniques, farmers may join together to form cooperatives or other suitable mechanisms that would retain farm ownership. Foreign firms may be given minority ownership in exchange for expertise and equipment. This way land produces maximum yield and the local farmers benefit from the fruits of their land.

There was and is great concern that the Sri Lankan Government would use the post-war situation to further colonize the northeast by settling Sinhalese. There are already reports of such colonization in the east. Such colonization occurred in the east a few decades ago also when the Sri Lankan army and armed Sinhalese drove out Tamil farmers from their lands and settled Sinhalese in the east. The government purchase of land is, in fact, another form of colonization. The new landlords (either the government or foreign investors) may allow local Tamils to live in the land as landless hired laborers now. But the new landlords could throw these people out of the land and bring in others from outside whenever they want. Yes, it is another form of colonization, and it should be stopped.

[Summary: Sri Lankan ethnic conflict and Sinhala attempts of colonization of Tamil homeland.]

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