The Gujral Committee Report - Language in India

need to provide for affiliation of schools in any State to bodies outside the State. As for colleges, it was a matter for the inter University Board to consider. 8. Item 6-Use of Minority Languages for Official purposes. no
State Reorganisation Commission has recommended that if there is a substantial minority Constituting 30 per cent or more of the population of a State, the State should be recognised as bilingual for administrative purposes and that, if 70 per cent or more of The
total population of a District is constituted by a group which is a minority in the State the
a whole , the language of the minority group and not the State language should be official language in that district. In districts, municipal areas and smaller units where there are minorities constituting 15 to 20 per cent of the population, Government as
Electoral Rolls, etc. should be printed in both the languages and documents in minority languages should be permitted to be filed in courts. These recommendations were considered by the Committee which noted that there was no single minority group notices,
any of the four States reconstituting more than 30 per cent of the total population of in
State or 70 per cent or more of the population of a district. It observed that neither the two safeguards contemplated by the States Reorganisation Commission (viz., declaring the State to be bilingual or declaring a language other than that of the majority the
the official language of a district) had any application to any of the four States. As regards the suggestion of the Commission regarding recognition. of minority languages for specific purposes in a district or a smaller area, it was decided that every municipal as
and the non-municipal area of every taluk, should be treated as a separate local town
for this purpose and that a list of such local areas where 20 per cent of the people of a taluk or municipality spoke a language different from that of a majority language of the State should be Prepared for each State. The following steps should be taken in area
Language in India www.languageinindia.com
893
9 : 1 January 2009
The Gujral Committee Report
respect of every local area included in the list thus prepared- (i) All important Government notices and rules, Electroal Rolls. etc. should be published in the minority language or languages. (ii) Forms etc., to be used by the public should be printed both in the regional language and in the minority language.
on Urdu