Mangaluru: In a bid to promote Tulu language 'Jai Tulunad' organization is teaching the language online, free of cost, and has trained as many as 1,500 people under this initiative during the three months of lockdown.
'Jai Tulunad' is an organization which is at the forefront in promoting the Tulu language, recently, demanding to include Tulu, one of the Pancha Dravida languages, in the new National Education Policy (NEP), the organization had started a Tweet Tulunad campaign with a Hashtag Education in Tulu (#EducationInTulu).
For the past three years, the organization had been teaching Tulu script free of cost in schools and due to COVID-19 restrictions, the 'Jai Tulunad' is now actively training people who are keen on learning the language online.
The organization has created three WhatsApp groups. Each group has two to three teachers. After they received a good response they began promoting their online classes on social media.
After seeing their social media posts regarding the class people from other cities like Bengaluru and Mumbai also expressed interest in learning the script and currently, there are over 53 WhatsApp groups of which 34 groups are for male students and 18 for female students. Female teachers are assigned to teach female students and male teachers for male students. A girl from Nagaland studying in Manipal had also shown interest in learning Tulu.
So far there are around 50 teachers and close to 1,500 students learning Tulu script. The age group of students ranges from 5 to 70 years.
While 'Jai Tulunad' is an organization is busy teaching Tulu online, Tulu Sahithya Academy President Dayanand Kathalsar has decided to start a Tulu campaign by taking up signboards in Tulu and the names of bus stands and market in Tulu. He has already held a discussion with Bajpe Gram Panchayat in this regard.
Tulu language is the mother tongue of people in coastal districts. People have been demanding to include Tulu in the Eighth Schedule of the Constitution and to declare it as an official language in the state. The people of Tulunad have been demanding recognition for Tulu language for the last several decades.
Tulu language has a history of 2,500 years and more than 1.5 crore people speak Tulu language, which has its own script as well. Poems and prose were written in Tulu even before the 14th century. Ramayana and Mahabharata are also available in Tulu script. There are several inscriptions, copper-plate inscriptions, palm leaf manuscripts available in Tulu language in the coastal belt.
The inscriptions stated that land from Neeleshwara to Ankola as Tulu Rajya. Hence, there is a need for recognition for Tulu language.
