Agartala, Jan 19 :The Chairman of Tripura Tribal Areas Autonomous District Council (ADC) and veteran tribal leader Jagadish Debbarma on Wednesday alleged that both the state and central governments for the last four decades doing politics over Kokborok language (tribal dialect) spoken all the indigenous communities of Tripura.

Tripura has been observing Kokborok Day (Tripuri language Day) on January 19 every year with a series of programmes for the development of the Kokborok language, which was recognised as the official language 43 years ago and this has little exception due to the Covid19 pandemic.

Debbarma underlined Kokborok was recognised as an official language in 1979, still, it is not included in the 8th schedule of the constitution.

Kokborok has a long and dynamic history, which is one of the ancient languages of the northeast being spoken by the indigenous people of Tripura and neighbouring Bangladesh and nowadays courses on Kokborok started at college and university level but the script of the language remained unresolved.

Debbarma apprehended the crisis of Kokborok might deepen further unless immediate steps would not be taken for development and promotion, as due to negligence many languages had vanished from history and added, “In Tripura, Communist, Congress and BJP and at the centre Congress and BJP always express sympathy for Kokborok and tribal development but didn’t do enough practically for development and progress of the communities, their life, culture and language.”

“Two language commissions formed to assess and make recommendations on Kokborok script have given their nod towards introduction of Roman script. As many as 67 per cent of the Kokborok speaking population wants that Kokborok is taught through Roman script but the government has not yet taken the decision about the script that created uncertainty about the future of the language,” Debbarma stated.

This debate on the script has been made alive by some vested interest quarters to take political mileage out of it.

A significant number of Indian languages have vanished due to lack of practice. The new generation must come forward to save this language and press the government to include Kokborok in the 8th schedule of the constitution and finalise the script immediately, he demanded.

Meanwhile, opposition CPI-M paid homage to the martyr Dhananjoy Tripura who had sacrificed his life in 1975 at Jolaibari of South Tripura in the struggle for recognition of Kokborok.

After coming to power in 1979, the first Left Front government had recognised Kokborok as the official language of Tripura along with Bengali and English.