CHENNAI: Despite the State government’s continued opposition to the Union government’s push for a third language under the National Education Policy (NEP), students under the State Board syllabus will appear for an optional third language public examination on Monday.
Under the NEP, the Union government had announced that from the 2026-2027 academic year, students in Class 6 and above may study any Indian language as an optional subject in addition to their mother tongue and English. Schools will allow students to choose a language of their preference.
However, Tamil Nadu has consistently opposed the introduction of a third language, arguing that it could pave the way for Hindi imposition. The State government has reiterated its firm resistance to such measures for a long time.
In this context, 5,027 Tamil Nadu State Board students will take the optional third language exam tomorrow. Notably, most of them are from minority institutions or families that have migrated from other states. The languages on offer include Gujarati, French, Sanskrit, Urdu, and others.
The Class 10 public examinations began on March 11, and the main five subject exams have already been completed. The optional language paper will be the final exam.
According to official data, the number of candidates per language is as follows: Arabic – 1,003; French – 22; Gujarati – 11; Hindi – 526; Kannada – 217; Malayalam – 257; Sanskrit – 427; Telugu – 139; and Urdu – 2,425. This brings the total to 5,027 students.
Since this is an optional subject, it is not mandatory for all students. Only those who have specifically opted for a third language are required to take the exam.