Indian and foreign: On the CBSE and third language

The controversy over introducing a third language from Class 6 onwards stems from an unresolved contradiction in the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 . At several places, the NEP, rightly, extols the special importance of English, especially in mathematics, science and even legal education, and does not club it with other “foreign” languages such as French or Spanish. At the same time, it advocates the three-language formula, with two languages required to be native to India, one of them Ideally the mother tongue, in effect relegating English to the status of a foreign language. The Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) has implemented this aspect of the NEP, ignoring other welcome observations the policy makes on language learning. While introducing three languages from Class 6 onwards, it said students currently in Classes 7, 8 and 9 should also study three languages, of which two should be “Bharatiya”, in effect relegating English to the status of a foreign language. Thus, if a student had taken French as a second language along with English, they would have had to forego French and switch to two Bharatiya languages, one of which would be entirely new to them. This could adversely affect their Class 10 Board examination performance, apart from rendering redundant the capability and teaching resources schools had built in those foreign languages. Following the backlash, the CBSE has said students in Classes 7, 8 and 9 need take only one additional Bharatiya language if they had taken English and, say, Spanish. The third language, moreover, will not be tested in their Class 10 Board examinations. These are, however, temporary arrangements and the CBSE is going ahead with the three language policy with two Bharatiya languages from Class 6 onwards.