Gujarati to be compulsory from Class 3-8 from next year: Gujarat government

Following the lines of Maharashtra, making Marathi compulsory across all boards till class 8, Gujarat government is all set to mandate Gujarati on similar lines.

State education minister Bhupendrasinh Chudasama on Wednesday, during the Assembly, announced that from the new academic year, the Gujarati language will be made mandatory to be offered from class 3-8 in CBSE and CISCE Council for the Indian School Certificate Examinations schools that conducts the ICSE examination.

While some felt that this decision was expected as most of the states have made their local language mandatory, a few also opined that this will put children of CBSE into difficulty as most of them belong to different parts of the country. A teacher said, “I am from Bengal and my husband has a transferable job. It will be very difficult for my daughter to cope with so many languages.”

Speaking to DNA, Bhupendrasinh Chudasama said, “We cannot afford to forget our mother tongue. Gujaratis themselves are forgetting the language. There is no respect for any language. Every state has made their local language mandatory and hence we thought this is the best time to make it mandatory. Thinking about the students, we have not mandated from higher standards but lower standards so that children get a grip on the language.”