Why Bilingual Books in Other Languages…
Why Bilingual Books in Other Languages?
One of the efforts of the Government of Maharashtra to promote reading culture, Marathi literature and language development in Maharashtra is the Village of Books. However, there are now English and Gujarati books in addition to Marathi. It is raising the question of how exactly the state government’s decision will enable Marathi reading culture.
Why Bilingual Books in Other Languages? M Ta Special Agent, Mumbai
One of the efforts of the Government of Maharashtra to promote reading culture, Marathi literature and language development in Maharashtra is the Village of Books. However, there are now English and Gujarati books in addition to Marathi. It is raising the question of how exactly the state government’s decision will enable Marathi reading culture.
Deepak Pawar, the president of the Center for Marathi Studies has criticized this. Bilaar’s book project and Marathi reading culture have no relation, he said. The true function of conservation and conservation of Marathi language does not seem to be there. If you start this project for Marathi language, why are you planning to keep books in other languages here? A library or a private institute will also be run by the Government of Maharashtra for all languages. It is the responsibility of the state government to strengthen the Marathi language. Therefore, Pawar has raised the question whether keeping books in other languages is a given to the culture of reading or to tourism. He also demanded to furnish statistics on how many other commentators come to Villar. In this regard, Anand Bhandare of Marathi Language Studies Center has also argued that it is necessary to show the richness of Marathi language to the visiting tourists. He said that keeping other language tourists in place will keep Marathi in their language books for them.
In this regard, books in other languages are said to be the second phase of the project. It is also understood that the idea of buying Gujarati and Hindi language books is in the second phase. Currently there are about two thousand English books in the book town. Discussions have also started with Hindi Sahitya Akademi and Gujarati Sahitya Akademi for the purchase of books in other languages. But in this regard, Bhushan Gagrani, Principal Secretary of the Marathi Language Department, said that the priority of the Marathi is to say that the identity of the villagers is increasing as a village. Multilingual families go to these places, these books have been kept at the demand of the tourists who come to read them. Other language books will not be kept in large quantities but are accepted only in the form of donations. There is no government spending for books in other languages. He also said that it was not planned to include books of other languages in the extension of the project. Gagrani argued that the fact that Marathi readers should stay here for longer is also included in other languages.
In principle there is nothing wrong with bringing books of other languages but the Marathi form of the book village should be preserved. The question is how many tourists from other languages come here and how many read them. This village was created as a book village for the conservation of Marathi, this feature should be preserved.