Expert committee recommends classical status to Odia language

BHUBANESWAR: It’s a big step towards getting approval from the Central Government after the linguistic committee under the Kendra Sahitya Akademi on Tuesday recommended the Union Culture Ministry to accord classical status to Odia language.

In a meeting with the linguistic committee in New Delhi, eminent linguist Padmashree Debi Prasanna Pattanayak and his team presented their views regarding the literary tradition of Odia language, its high antiquity of early texts, recorded history over a period of 1500 to 2000 years and the literature being distinct from modern.

Recently an 11-member committee headed by Patnaik prepared a report which was submitted to the Centre demanding classical status for Odia language.

After the meeting with the linguistic committee, Patnaik said that the committee expressed satisfaction over the report. “The expert committee lauded the all the parameters the language meets for the status and confirmed about recommending the Union Culture Ministry to grant classical status to Odia,” he said.

Patnaik said that after Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, Sanskrit and Malayalam, it would be the sixth language to get the classical status. The decision taken on Tuesday will be forwarded to the Central Government which will take final decision regarding the approval, he added.

Earlier, a conference was organised here where two committees were formed to start the movement for getting the approval. One was the action committee headed by Rajya Sabha member Ramachandra Khuntia and another was a drafting committee headed by eminent linguist Pattanayak. A draft of 465 pages was prepared and submitted to the President of India, the Prime Minister, the Union Culture Minister and the Kendra Sahitya Akademy.

“After the movement started since March 12 last year, I have already raised three questions in the Parliament to give classical status to Odia language,” said Khuntia.        

The action committee had organised a conference in New Delhi where Union Minster of State for PMO V Narayanasamy attended as the chief guest of the occasion. Narayansami had told that he would support the demand and talk to the Prime Minister for the approval of the cabinet. “We are very much thankful to the expert committee for recommending the proposal. We also thankful to eminent littérateur Devi Prasanna Pattanayak and his team for drafting a wonderful draft which gave us a major step to get the status,” said Khuntia.