THE Punjab government recently announced that, come March 2020, the medium of teaching at government primary schools will switch from English to Urdu, reversing a system introduced by the Shahbaz Sharif setup a decade ago. The details of the survey this decision was based on have now come to light, confirming just how difficult it is for young learners to deal with the ‘alien’ language. The survey was conducted in 22 districts, all of which favoured a shift to Urdu. Experts have spoken in support of a move away from English, arguing that imposing a mode of instruction in a second or foreign language on students in their early developmental years hampers their conceptual understanding and cognitive development. Even in higher education, teachers often resort to lecturing in their mother tongue if not proficient enough in English. The emphasis here, though, is on ‘mother tongue’, which may or may not be Urdu.

The survey presupposes Urdu as the mother tongue of both teachers and students, as it helps build an easy case against a more intimidating, more ‘foreign’ instruction in English. Yet, in an age of awareness and eager assertion of ethnic identities and the right to speak native languages, it is remarkable how Urdu — the national language of Pakistan — is conveniently passed off as a kind of universal mother tongue of all Pakistanis. This may be far from the truth in the case of the areas surveyed. Indeed, such a casual assumption about the mother tongue of the majority in historically more sensitive parts of the country may well have been a source of controversy. The debate does ultimately remind us of our inability to promote our multilingualism by developing national languages to a level where they may automatically serve as medium of instruction, and how it has made us lag behind in achieving universal basic literacy. This is where even the more privileged Urdu will struggle as it is set to replace English as the medium of primary level learning in Punjab.

Published in Dawn, August 28th, 2019