The Kerala government on April 11 announced that the governor had given his nod to the ordinance that makes Malayalam mandatory in all schools in the state up to class 10. The ordinance that was promulgated last week will come into force from the upcoming academic session.
While speaking to the media, Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan said that the rule shall be applied in all government, aided, un-aided, self-funding institutions, including those affiliated to CBSE and ICSE streams. However, he affirmed that it Malayalam language was not compulsory for foreign students and students from other states appearing for class 10.
“The law (ordinance) clearly states that schools should not impose any direct or indirect ban against speaking Malayalam. It also states that no boards should be erected in the campus directing students to use any language other than Malayalam,” Vijayan told the reporters adding that the NoC of the schools where Malayalam is not taught shall be cancelled.
“For non-Malayali students, we will not make it mandatory for them to pass in Malayalam (in Class 10). The respective schools must do whatever is in its capacity to help these students learn Malayalam, if they so chose to,” News Minute quoted the CM as saying.
Additionally, schools will have to pay a fine of Rs 5000 if they failed to apply the said rules. This development after the Kerala government figured that some of the school were not teaching the language to the students.
In the year 2012, Kerala High Court had dismissed the rule laid down by the government that made it compulsory to teach Malayalam in CBSE schools by stating that some outstation students also study in these CBSE and ICSE schools.
