Shri Sanjay Kumar, Secretary, Department of School Education and Literacy (DoSEL), Ministry of Education, chaired a stakeholder consultation meeting on 28 June 2024, to discuss the creation of a platform for organizing district, state, and national-level writing competitions in Indian languages. Officials from DoSEL, CBSE, NBT, NCERT, Navodaya Vidyalaya Samiti (NVS), SCERTs, and representatives from 9 states participated in the meeting.
Collaboration and Moving Forward
Shri Sanjay Kumar emphasized the importance of integrating these efforts into a structured framework by collaborating with various stakeholders. 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, he added. He also said that the schools will organize competitions at the state/district level in various languages, shortlisting participants for the national-level competition organized by CBSE. Shri 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.
JS (I&T) Smt Prachi Pandey 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. The stakeholder consultation signifies a collaborative effort by the DoSEL and various stakeholders to create a comprehensive platform for nurturing reading and writing skills in Indian languages at all levels.
Enhancing Reading and Writing Skills
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.
Sharing Best Practices
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.
