National Education Policy: Chinese dropped from 2019 languages list

The National Education Policy (NEP) approved by the Union cabinet two days ago does not mention ‘Chinese’ among the foreign languages it cites as examples students can learn at the secondary level.

The ‘Chinese’ language (rather than Mandarin or Cantonese) was mentioned in the draft released in 2019. It had named French, German, Spanish, Chinese and Japanese as foreign languages which could be offered as electives, and not in place of the three-language formula.

The approved policy released by the Centre on Wednesday omits Chinese.

‘Chinese out of NEP, reason is obvious’
The ones cited are Korean, Japanese, Thai, French, German, Spanish, Portuguese and Russian “for students to learn about the cultures of the world and enrich their global knowledge and mobility according to their own interests and aspirations”.

An official associated with the formulation of the final NEP said he was unaware of the change, but “the reasons are obvious”. India has banned over 100 Chinese apps following a face-off with China in eastern Ladakh. Foreign-language teachers say Chinese as a language was gaining popularity in Bengaluru since 2017, and was set to surpass many Asian languages, including Japanese.

However, no one signed up for the March 2020 programme for the Chinese language.

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