Language Friendship Bridge

In News

• The Indian Council for Cultural Relations (ICCR) has envisaged a special project called The Language Friendship Bridge.

Language Friendship Bridge

• About:
  • ICCR will create a pool of experts in 10 languages from some neighbouring countries and others who share a cultural heritage with India.
• Objective: 
  • India plans to expand  its cultural footprint in nations with whom it has historical ties, including those in its immediate neighbourhood.
• Countries: 
  • Myanmar, Sri Lanka, Uzbekistan and Indonesia to facilitate better people-to-people exchanges.
• Languages: 
  • Kazakh, Uzbek, Bhutanese, Ghoti (spoken in Tibet), Burmese, Khmer (spoken in Cambodia), Thai, Sinhalese and Bahasa (spoken in both Indonesia and Malaysia).
• Implementation: 
  • ICCR plans to train five to 10 people in the official languages of these countries and plans to roll out the project by this year.
• University consultations:
  •  ICCR is in discussion with universities and institutes as well as experts offering foreign language courses in the country on the modalities of implementing the project.
• Two possibilities to rollout the project: 
  • One is to institute tie-ups wherein teachers from these countries come and teach courses in India. 
  • The second approach is ICCR offering scholarships to Indian students to go and study these languages in the countries where they are spoken.

Need & Significance for the Project

• In India, the language learning focus till now has been on European languages like Spanish, French and German, along with the languages of major Asian economies like China and Japan. 
• India requires translators, interpreters and teachers in the languages of the countries with whom it shares a cultural history.
• A large number of people are visiting India for treatment from countries like Turkey, Bangladesh, Afghanistan and Maldives and there is an urgent need for a pool of translators and interpreters for facilitating their visits as well.
• With India seeing a boom in cultural and economic ties with other neighbouring countries the move was needed and experts also feel that the ICCR’s list of languages needs to be expanded.

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