Wednesday, June 21, 2006

"The World is Flat", let us learn English!

There is a lot of mention of Bangalore in the book "The World is Flat". A few years down the road, Bangalore should get replaced by Pune, Chennai or Hyderabad. Politicians in Bangalore are cashing out on software investments. Pune and its surroundings are doing great!

I am glad to see a reduction in pure Marathi Schools. Not that the Marathi curriculum is weak, but the public school teachers definitely are. Out of the 11 public school friends I knew, only one passed 12th! These were relatively smart guys studying in ultra-horrible schools.

It is nice to know that English is being planned as a compulsary subject. I thought that would be a given, but I guess one can never assume anything with politicians around! English has to be taught, given that it is a global language. Hindi should be the language that gets the axe instead of English. Most of South India seems to have done this with good results. Thanks to songs and movies, everyone gets a free grounding in Hindi, Punjabi and Urdu, whether they realize it or not!

If Germans and Chinese can learn English in school, surely Maharashtrians can and should? Why ostracize an ethnic public schooled Maharashtrian to a life of poverty by deliberately taking away English from him?

Maharashtra interactive map

Maharashtra Video search

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