Konkani forums oppose Devanagari as lone official script of language
MANGALURU: The Global Konkani Forum (GKF) and Mandd Sobhann have condemned the 'arbitrary decision' of the Sahitya Akademi Konkani Advisory Board to declare Devanagari as the lone official script of the Konkani language.
At a symposium jointly organised here on Sunday, they termed the Board's decision as discriminatory towards the four other scripts of Konkani, and also demanded equal status for the Roman script, along with Devanagari, in the Official Language Act of Goa.
They unanimously passed a resolution to oppose the Sahitya Akademi stand of recognizing and promoting only one script of Konkani.
"In perseverance of this, we will take all actions, including legal steps, to impress upon the government to include other scripts of Konkani for Sahitya Awards," said a release.
They also resolved to form a new action committee under the leadership of Kennedy Afonso. The new committee includes Eric Ozario, Stany Alvares, Louis Pinto, Richard Moras, Stephen Quadros, Donald Pereira, Kennedy Afonso, Jose Salvador Fernandes, Aplonia Rebello, Luis Xavier Mascarenhas, Cruz Mario Pereira, Michael Jude Gracias, Antonio Alvares and Dominic Fernandes.
Ozario and other Mandd Sobhann members expressed full confidence in the leadership of Afonso, to take this movement to its logical conclusion and have extended full support and cooperation to the movement.
Afonso, the President of Global Konkani Forum, gave a presentation and explained the need for the various associations of Konkani to come together to fight this discrimination against the five scripts of Konkani and for the inclusion of Roman script in the Official Language Act of Goa, by filing a petition in the Supreme Court.
Karnataka Konkani Sahithya Academy President Stany Alvares said the language academies of the Karnataka government have come to a conclusion that literature in Kannada script will be given priority and they would also pressurize the (Central) Sahitya Akademi to give equal status to Konkani literature in Kannada script in parallel with the Devanagari script.
Activist and music composer Ozario said, “It’s an accepted fact that, although Konkani is written in five scripts, it has no script of its own and despite this fact, back in 1981, the Konkani Advisory Board of the Sahitya Akademi passed a unanimous resolution saying that Devanagari is the official script of Konkani. If one looks at the list of the Board members, it becomes very clear that it’s filled by hard core supporters of Devanagari.”
Ozario said this is an attempt to destroy all other scripts and impose Devanagari on everyone, as is done in the Official Language Act of Goa. This is detrimental to the unity and development of Konkani as Konkani literature is acceptable for Sahitya awards only in Devanagari script, which discriminates against literature produced in other scripts, he said.
Unity in diversity is the mantra of the nation and is also the future of Konkani language, he added.
