THREE years ago, when I was looking for a school for my son, I visited several schools. On these visits when I was found speaking our mother tongue to my son, school personnel dared to ask me why I wasn’t speaking English to my son.

I asked why? Why should I not speak to my son in a language he can learn only at home? English or the second and third languages can be learnt at school, college or university in an institutional arrangement. And how would he survive in a society where 99pc people cannot talk in English?

I found something interesting on these visits: the higher the fee and the bigger the school, the more fluent were the skills of teachers at spoken English. The lower the fee and smaller the school, less fluent was English of teachers.

It is needless to say that we are still slaves to our colonising gods. This inferiority complex regarding local languages and practices is so deep that the upper class in Pakistan wants its children to learn English only.

Some African countries such as Burkina Faso, Algeria and Botswana colonised by France still love and take pride in French as their lingua franca, more than what we feel for English.

Other Arab countries in Africa and the Middle East are so strict about Arabic as the order of the day they wouldn’t compromise on teaching their children Arabic or speaking among themselves in the presence of their non-Arabic-speaking friends, no matter what price they have to pay.

Those children who learn sciences in Urdu and Sindhi understand more than when they are bumped with sciences in English as soon as they reach college level.

There can be thousands of reasons why the college dropout ratio is so high in Pakistan. In my understanding English is the number one reason why students feel simply daunted and cheat in examinations.

Anita Shah Lakyary

Jamshoro

Published in Dawn, August 29th, 2015

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