Movement to teach locals, diaspora Tamil

Speaking to DT Next , Viswanathan, who will lead the movement, said, “A meeting will be held in Chennai on June 2 to which members of various state-level Tamil associations have been invited.” The meeting would decide on various “steps to ensure that the continued purity of Tamil does not deteriorate”, Viswanathan added. 

To ensure that it is a continuing exercise, “Talks would be held with the state and central governments to request them to use Tamil teachers in their schools, colleges and universities to undertake teaching Tamil to locals who require it, after office hours,” Viswanathan said. Similarly, “Retired teachers would be approached and provided honoraria to teach the language to the present generation abroad. Locals there would be requested to contribute to the upkeep of such teachers in their respective countries,” Viswanathan added. “With 1.50 crore Tamils in India (excluding Tamil Nadu) and a similar number spread around the world, the present generation  does not know Tamil,” Viswanathan said. “While the present generation’s grandparents can speak, read and write the language, their fathers can only speak and not write Tamil, while the current generation can neither read nor write,” he added. Coming down heavily on Tamil newspapers which generally confused the singular and plural in their writings, he said a soonto-be formed committee “planned to visit and interact with Tamil paper editors on the issue.  We will request them to appoint a Tamil expert to ensure that  such mistakes were avoided”, he concluded.