Eighth Schedule to the Indian Constitution contains a list of 22 scheduled languages and the government of India is under an obligation to take all possible measures for the development of these languages, such that "they grow rapidly in richness and become effective means of communicating modern knowledge." As per the list:
Konkani: Is applicable to GOA, Karnataka, Maharashtra, and Kerala Marathi: Is applicable to Maharashtra, GOA, Dadra & Nagar Haveli, Daman and Die, Madhya Pradesh, and Karnataka However, ENGLISH is not included in the 8th Schedule of the Indian Constitution but is given a secondary official language status for using it for all official purposes along with Hindi. As per 8th Schedule, Konkani as well as Marathi is applicable to whole of Goa. And one must not forget that during Portuguese rule Goa never had Konkani primary schools as is today. On the contrary, during those days, entire Goa mostly had Marathi primary schools. Secondly, Konkani is yet to be developed to a level of Marathi is an undisputable fact. For these reasons, MARATHI is also treated as regional language of GOA and hence probably Konkani and Marathi are clubbed together while presenting feedback data. It is equally sad to see that preferential choice of Goan parents places Konkani in the 3rd position and with recent unilateral MOI that is being imposed by Digamber Kamat in Goa is going to further destroy the growth of Konkani language and the Goan culture in Goa! Moreover, Digambar's decision has divided Goans vertically and has brought Marathi and Konkani speaking persons together which had never happened after 19th December 1961 - this is yet another warring factor. More detailed feedback figures have also appeared in TOI - Goa edition, dated 28/7/2011, front page, under title "Parents choose Mother Tongue over English". And still, if one feels that his / her queries are not answered by new media, one can directly contact Dr. Celsa Pinto, Director of Education, Directorate of Education. Panaji -Goa for more impartial clarifications on the issue of MOI. Best regards, U. G. Barad Michael Fernandes wrote: Looks like the survey clearly suits the Marathi protagonist That this survey is biased can be seen by the way numbers have been added up to show that the people of Goa has rejected English outright. 1. Out of the 905 government primary schools what is the break up of konkani and marathi schools? 2. As for the overall count for entire Goa Out of 61,000 students: 33,000 students opted for regional language (Marathi and Konkani together)why take Marathi and Konkani together? Is it only because, if the count is taken separately then English will clearly be in the lead? The Marathivadis have taken the support of konkani in their count only to defeat English and once that is done konkani too will be dumped for marathivadis to rule over Goa. It will be in the best interest of the Goans to read between the lines and not let these marathivadis to fool us.
