Learn langauges: Spot right institute for you!

“It is the love for the language that made me what I am today” said Prasoon Joshi, a leading advertising professional and poet.  From creative writing to advertising, from translation to interpretation, a good command over the language is crucial for any profession. With increasing avenues for production and consumption of information, information-overload has crept into our day-to-day activities of consumption. And that demands superior communication from any product that targets to retain our attention.

This has resulted in renewed interest in the language programmes. Traditionally universities have been offering BA, MA courses in languages, especially Indian languages. Some universities like Delhi University, Jawaharlal Nehru University and University of Hyderabad also offer very good foreign education programmes. Amongst the pantheon of Indian languages Hindi, Urdu and Sanskrit have always had a special place in our public domain.  

Hence in the public sector we have three major institutions focusing on all three of them. The Central Institute of Indian Languages is primarily a research organisation and looks at literature and oral traditions in India. An accredited PhD centre, it specialises in offering short-term programmes in 11 Indian languages at all its 11 centres. But the other two, Rashtriya Sanskrit Vidyapeeta and the Kendriya Hindi Sanasthan are both university-level institutions, and they come under the public sector only because their administrative control in not with the UGC. Urdu has only recently received renewed attention  from the public sector.

The National Council for Urdu Language that has traditionally been offering a very effective diploma in the language is now spreading its wings to offer a slew of short term programmes for language appreciation. They are very effective institutions in preservation of language and culture and offer academic programmes from UG to doctoral studies. Focus on Sanskrit as a language for computing has not received the attention it deserves says, Dr Trilochan Sastry, a computing language expert and freelancing Sanskrit scholar at Centre for Development of Telematics (C-DAC), Pune.

Translation is another exciting domain that institutions have just begun to focus on. The National Council for Promotion of Urdu Language has begun a translation unit to bring in scientific literature in this language. While universities like Jawaharlal Nehru University and Delhi University have caught on with the launch of specialised programmes focusing on this domain, these public sector institutions are yet to open their account in this respect.