Bhubaneswar Bureau
When Minister for External Affairs Ms. Sushma Swaraj inaugurated the multi-lingual website of the Prime Minister on May 29, there was no trace of Oriya, even though six regional languages, besides English and Hindi, had place for them. They were Gujarati, Malayalam, Marathi, Tamil, Telugu and Bengali.
Immediately after this surfaced BHASHA ANDOLAN Chairman Subhas Chandra Pattanayak, President Pradyumna Satpathy, and convener Pabitra Maharatha raised vehement protests in an instantly called press conference and condemned the disrespect shown to Oriya, despite the reality that Oriya has been recognized as Classical language, because of being the oldest and original language of India.
The first Linguistic Survey of India had made it clear that Oriya language is so very vast in antiquity and vocabulary that neither Telugu nor Bengali nor Hindi can vie with it.
So, despite the evil design to keep Oriya out of eligibility for classical status by increasing the seniority factor, after bestowing the status on Telugu, Oriya was the unanimous choice of the Linguistic Committee for classical status.
When it was found that Oriya was left out when languages like Gujarati, Marathi and Bengali – far away from Oriya’s unique distinction – were in the PMO site, it was viewed as a deliberate official attempt to belittle the dignity of the majestic mother tongue of the people of Orissa.
Therefore, in their impromptu press meet, particularly with the TV channels, the three office bearers of BHASHA ANDOLAN noted supra had condemned the “mischief” and had demanded for correction of the committed wrong. On 2nd June, the day of PM’s Balasore speech, Dharitri had interviewed them on the issue. Their views, as published by the major daily in its 3rd June edition, are placed below for documentation.
Voice of BHASHA ANDOLAN has been heard. The wrong committed against Oriya in the PM’s site has been removed and Oriya has been included, which is available at www.pmindia.gov.in/ory
BHASHA ANDOLAN, on this positive development, has thanked the PM.
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