Chennai, Feb 16 (UNI) Tamil Nadu Chief Minister and DMK President MK Stalin on Sunday
strongly objected to Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan's remarks that the State
will not get its funds till it accepted the three-language formula under the New Education Policy
(NEP) and termed it as sheer blackmail.
Objecting to Mr Pradhan's remarks at Varanasi after the inauguration of the Kashi Tamil
Sangamam 3-0 last eveing, Mr Stalin said ‘Tamils will never tolerate the arrogance’ of
imposing Hindi.
Mr Pradhan said they have to come to the terms of the Indian Constitution...'rule of law'.
He also sought to know from Mr Pradhan as to which provision in the Constitution has
mandated the three-language policy compulsory.
In a post on X, Mr Stalin said the Union Education Minister says they have to come to
terms with the Indian Constitution and terms the three-language formula as the ‘rule of
law’.
"Can he say which provisions of the Constitution makes this mandatory?”, he sought to
know.
Observing that India is a Union of States, he said education is under the Concurrent List
for which the Union Government can’t claim entire ownership as its fiefdom!”
“Blackmailing Tamil Nadu with such arrogance that the state won’t be given funds (meant
for education under the SSA Scheme) till it accepts the three-language formula can’t be
tolerated by the Tamils,” he said with a hashtag #StopHindiImposition.
"We are asking only our rights. If you talk with such arrogance as if we are asking your
private property, Delhi’s arrogance will be shown the real face of the Tamils", he added.
Mr Pradhan had stated that Tamil Nadu had to accept the three-language formula like
other states in the country for funds to be released under the SSA scheme.
He also claimed that TN had initially accepted the NEP, but had backtracked later due to
political motivation.
Mr Pradhan said the Centre would not release funds to TN unless it implements the NEP
as done by other states that makes three-language formula implementation compulsory.
He said the state government was adopting divisive tactics and questioned what's wrong in
having a three-language formula where in the students could learn Tamil, English, Kannada
and other languages.
He also said NEP states that the students to study in their mother tongue. Will Tamil Nadu
oppose this.
It may be noted that Tamil Nadu has long been maintaining that it would stick to its two-language
formula and would not accept the NEP-2020 and Chief Minister M K Stalin too had written a
number of letters to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, expressing reservations over some clauses
in it and urging him to release the due funds under the SSA in the interests of students.
The Opposition AIADMK too objected to Mr Pradhan's remarks and said there was no dilution
in its stand on two-language formula.
The AIADMK will stick to its stand of two-language formula and would never allow three-language
formula. The party will stoutly oppose Hindi imposition, senior leader and former State Minister
D Jayakumar said today.
Mr Jayakumar said AIADMK General Secretary and Leader of the Opposition Edappadi
K Palaniswami had clearly stated that the party would only and always stick to the two
language policy and that there was no compromise in it.
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