On Thu September 28 2006 9:35 pm, freeman murray wrote: > Anyone down there have insight into this ?
The closest I can get to answering this is to suspect that someone is looking for a bribe. There are 3 or 4 new FM radio channels in Bangalore. An advert in one of them for Cartoon Network carries the voice of a mother saying that learning English is important - so get your kid to watch Cartoon Network. Of course it could be argued that the Karnataka Government is as much fun as Cartoon Network, and they might ask for Looney Tunes with Kannada voice overs. Frankly I think "money needs to exchange hands" is probably the explanation. It may be disguised as a licence fee that English teaching schools need to pay that has not been paid by these schools - but this is a wild guess. If you read Carol Upadhyaya's report - one of the points that is brought out is that IT enabled jobs go mainly to people who have some ability in English, which (who'da thunk it?) happens to occur in people descended from upper caste groups. So if the Govt of Karnataka wants to further it's desire to keep the state at the forefront of IT - it must encourage English education. But, OTOH if the Govt of Karnataka wants to further its desire that all ministers must make enough moolah for the next seven generations, the latter takes precedence over the former, since charity must begin at (the minister's) home. shiv
