Classical status to be urged for Meitei Mayek
Source: The Sangai Express

Imphal, February 19 2018: Language, Planning and Implementation, Manipur, Director, Dr Laishram Mahabir has claimed that the State Government has tasked the Department to approach the Ministry of Culture to include Manipur language as one of India's classical languages.

Speaking to The Sangai Express yesterday, the Director said that as a result of the continuous effort by the State Government, Meitei Mayek is now taught even at graduation level and added that the Government has also been able to eliminate the shortage of Meitei Mayek text books from the present academic session.

Pointing out that the Department has been tasked with ensuring that Meitei Mayek gets included as one of Indian classical languages, Mahabir said that numerous symposiums, workshops and seminars will be organised and feedback will be gathered from numerous experts regarding the matter.

With the help of the feedback from the experts, the Department will send a proposal to the Ministry so as to place Meitei Mayek among other Indian classical languages, he added.

Mahabir said that even though there were some inconveniences regarding unavailability of textbooks for the first semester of graduation students, the Department worked tirelessly with the publishers and experts to make sure that the necessary textbooks for the second semester students are available on the Department's website.

The Department has also been able to publish nine physical textbooks, which are now available at almost all major book stores across the State.

The Director explained that six, out of the nine textbooks (four MIL textbooks and five elective Manipuri textbooks), are published by private publishers while the remaining three were printed by various organisations.

He narrated some of the books which were translated into Meitei Mayek for the second semester students, including Khwairakpam Chaoba's Labangalata, Hijam Anganghal's Jahera, GC Tongbra's Chenghi Khujai, Hijam Guno's Laman, Pacha Meitei' s Imphal amasung masigi ishing nungsit ki phibam, Cultural Forum Manipur new Manipuri short stories and some select Manipuri SahityaParishad'sshortstories.

Replying to a query, Mahabir said that the Department has started works on compiling a Master's degree syllabus, collecting and translating necessary Bengali textbooks into Meitei Mayek.

Mentioning that there is still a time period of around two years before the students who are currently in second semester get to study for the Master's degree, Mahabir said that the Department will take up necessary works to ensure that the necessary materials and textbooks are ready for the students by that time.

The Director further said that the Department is also working on translating all Manipuri/Bengali paper of Manipur Public Service Commission and Union Public Service Commission, into Meitei Mayek.

He urged the people to take the benefit of the books and syllabus which are uploaded on the Department's website and which can be easily accessed with the help of an e-reader.

Translating and publishing Manipuri/Bengali textbooks into Meitei Mayek, is often not economically viable for publishers.

Although the Department is minutely monitoring the procedure, it is not viable for the Department to provide any financial assistance to the publisher at the current stage.

Replying to a query on the steps taken by the Department to include Meitei Mayek as a classical Indian language, Dr Mahabir said that it is not an easy task to lift a dialect/language to the'level of a classical language.

The language needs to fulfil four criteria including recorded histories of the language dating back to 1500 to 2000 years back, presence of books printed in the said language and or the language to be genuine and not a mixture of other languages etc, he added.

Taking all possible factors into account, the Department will collect the feedbacks and ideas from various experts and learned individuals with the help of seminars, symposiums and workshops and then send a proposal to the Ministry for the inclusion of Meitei Mayek as one of Indian classical languages.

He mentioned that six languages have been named as as Indian classical language, namely Tamil (2004), Sanskrit (2005), Telugu (2008), Kanada (2008), Malayalam (2013) and Oriya(2014) .

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