State Government wants centre to include Manipur language as one of India’s classical languages. This has been claimed by Dr Laishram Mahabir who is the Director of Language, Planning and Implementation, Manipur. He said that State Government asked his Department to approach Central Government in this regard.
Dr Laishram Mahabir further added that Meitei Mayek is now taught up to graduation level and the continuous efforts by the State Government regarding the availability of Meitei Mayek textbooks are appreciable. We have got the task of putting effort for inclusion of Meitei Mayek as one of the Indian classical languages. For this, Department will conduct symposiums, workshops and seminars to gather feedback from several experts regarding this matter. On the basis of their feedbacks, the Department will create a good proposal to the Ministry of Culture.
He further told that there are reports about some sort of unavailability of textbooks for graduate students of first semester. His department has worked out with the publishers to make sure the availability of necessary textbooks for students. Second semester students will be able to get books on the Department’s website.
Dr Mahabir also shared that six out of the nine textbooks are coming from private publishers and remaining three textbooks are printed by other organisations. His team has been able to publish nine physical textbooks and all are now available across the state in all major book stores.
According to him, some books were translated into Meitei Mayek for the second semester students, including Hijam Anganghal’s Jahera, Pacha Meitei’s Imphal amasung masigi ishing nungsit ki phibam, Hijam Guno’s Laman, Khwairakpam Chaoba’s Labangalata, GC Tongbra’s Chenghi Khujai, Cultural Forum Manipur new Manipuri short stories and few selected Manipuri Sahitya Parishad’s short stories.
About the question over work done regarding compilation of Master’s degree syllabus, he replied that there is still a reasonable time period before the students who are currently in second semester get to study for the Master’s degree. This requires collection and translation of necessary Bengali textbooks into Meitei Mayek. Department will do the needful to ensure availability of necessary materials and textbooks for the students by that time.
He said that Department is sincerely working on translating all Manipuri/Bengali paper of Manipur Public Service Commission and Union Public Service Commission, into Meitei Mayek. He also shared that translation of Manipuri/Bengali content into Meitei Mayek, is actually not that much economically viable for publishers. At this point of time, Department can’t provide any financial assistance to the publisher. Still, we are helping them as much as possible. People should take the benefit of uploaded books and syllabus on the Department’s website. These are easily accessible using an e-reader.