At a stakeholder consultation meeting convened by the union Ministry of Education on June 28 in New Delhi, ways for creation of a platform for organizing district, state, and national-level writing competitions in Indian languages were discussed by officials from Department of School Education and Literacy (DoSEL), CBSE, NBT, NCERT, Navodaya Vidyalaya Samiti (NVS), SCERTs, and representatives from nine states. Sanjay Kumar, Secretary, DoSEL, chaired the meeting.
The initiative aims to develop a methodology to promote students’ reading and writing skills across diverse languages, fostering multilingualism and encouraging children to express themselves in their native language. Discussions anchored on key aspects such as age groups, participating languages, and types of writing skills to be encouraged.
The ministry officials informed that the ongoing efforts and initiatives undertaken by States/UTs regarding reading and writing will be a prominent topic of discussion during the upcoming review meeting scheduled for mid-July 2024.
School Education Secretary told the meeting that DoSE&L would fulfill the objective of multilingualism by involving language experts and CBSE by seeking the support of SCERTs to support them in the evaluation process.
The schools will organize competitions at the state/district level in various languages, shortlisting participants for the national-level competition organized by CBSE. Sanjay Kumar urged on collaboration between SCERTs and the National Book Trust (NBT) to identify and onboard popular regional language books for the National Digital Library and the importance of integrating these efforts into a structured framework by collaborating with various stakeholders.
Presentations were delivered by representatives from CBSE and various states showcasing their existing writing competitions and reading initiatives. Key examples include:
- CBSE’s Expression Series:A quarterly activity for CBSE students, attracting around 5 lakh participants per quarter;
- Andhra Pradesh’s Spell Bee Programme:Conducted at Mandal, District, and State levels in selected states;
- Chhattisgarh’s Sidhi Programme:Focuses on promoting reading and writing skills primarily in four tribal languages: Halbi, Bhadri, Chhattisgarhi, and Gondi;
- Assam’s Gunotsav:An initiative aimed at enhancing the quality of education in elementary schools, with a focus on assessing and improving reading, writing, and mathematics learning levels;
- Uttar Pradesh’s “Kahani Sunane Ki Pratiyogita”:A district- and state-level storytelling competition for male and female teachers;
- Tamil Nadu’s Ilam-Thedi Kalvi:A two-week reading marathon for Classes 3 to 9 conducted in collaboration with Google; and
- Karnataka’s Nali Kali Programme:Targets students from Class 1 to 3, focusing on foundational literacy and establishing children’s libraries.
