Kathmandu, February 26, 2018: Schools in the different parts of the country have demanded textbooks in mother tongues. The government has allowed schools to teach certain subjects at primary level in the mother tongue of respective areas.
Paras Thakur, principal of Jaya Hanuman Primary School, Govindapur said, “Due to unavailability of textbooks in the local language, we have been facing difficulty teaching them. Most of the students of the school speak Bhojpuri and they don’t understand Nepali language due to which teaching, learning activities have been greatly affected.”
“From the early childhood development level to Grade five, there are 172 students in the school. They have been using textbooks prescribed by Curriculum Development Centre and there are no textbooks written in Bhojpuri Languages,” Thakur added.
Ram Prasad Yadav, Principal at Shree Nepal Rastriya Primary School, Gardual mentioned, “Although schools have been using Bhojpuri as a medium of pronouncement, children of Pokhariya Municipality are unable to understand it. He also clarified that “We have been asking Department of Education to provide textbooks in local languages for the last few years, but it has not heeded our request”.
According to Deputy Director of CDC Bishnu Adhikari, CDC has developed textbooks for 24 language subjects prescribed for the secondary level students as optional subjects.
Narayan Prasad Subedi, Deputy Director of Multilanguage Education Section at Department of Education said the school themselves could develop textbooks for primary level and should not have to take permission from Department of Education.
