History
Punjabi is Now Official Language of Punjab -
Finally!
A bill making Punjabi the official language of Punjab was unanimously passed by the State Assembly on Wednesday, September 10, 2008, fulfilling a decades-old demand.
The measure - the Punjab Official Language (Amendment) Bill, 2008 - paving the way for "comprehensive" use of Punjabi in the state administration, was approved by the Assembly yesterday.
Moving the bill, Education and Language Minister Sardarni Upinderjit Kaur said it was extremely important to monitor the implementation of status of Punjabi as the official language of the state by constituting state level and district level committees.
"Although Punjabi is a scheduled language under the Indian Constitution, yet being language of the minority community, it needs regular, systematic and planned development at both the national and international level, particularly in this era of modern information and communication technology", she said.
Supporting the bill, Sardar Ajit Inder Singh Mofar (MLA - Congress) said this decision is long overdue and ideally should have been made several decades earlier.
"If we keep ignoring it, we will forget the Punjabi language", he added. He said the Punjabi language must get priority in schools, colleges and other institutions.
The House also passed the Learning of Punjabi and Other Languages Bill 2008.
The bill will ensure that Punjabi is taught to all students studying in standards 1 to 10 as one of the compulsory subjects from the next academic session commencing in April 2009.
[Courtesy: Zee News]
September 11, 2008
Conversation about this article
1: I.J. Singh (New York, U.S.A.), September 12, 2008, 8:36 AM.
Good. It's about time.
2: Dhaliwal (Carteret, U.S.A.), September 12, 2008, 4:59 PM.
Really glad that Punjabi is finally the official language! Now our forefathers can Rest In Peace!
3: Pritam Singh Grewal (Canada), September 12, 2008, 9:57 PM.
So far so good, though this measure has come so late. Now let us see how sincerely the Act will be implemented.
4: Kuljeet Singh (Boston, U.S.A.), September 13, 2008, 11:50 AM.
Wow, now if only the Indian State could muster the decency and the resolve to not label Sikhs as Hindus in its constitution, as well as deliver long-delayed justice over the 1984 Genocide and pogroms, it might begin to acquire some legitamacy as a democracy.
5: Dr Jagmeet Kaur (Bhopal, India), September 16, 2008, 11:21 AM.
What about all the Punjabi people and especially the youth and children who do not speak in Punjabi and nor do their parents or grandparents? Which Bill will make it mandatory for all of us to love and cherish our mother tongue and converse in it? In places like Bhopal, the condition is pathetic with even grandparents speaking in Hindi with their grandchildren because the children cannot understand Punjabi! It hurts so much, especially when a parent told me "my son speaks Punjabi only at home, outside even with his parents he speaks only Hindi because it is not smart enough".