In this recent blog post, Sam reminds how S W R D Bandaranaike changed national language in 1956, something most people in the present generation [wrongly] call a "Sinhala-only" policy.
English was the Language in Sri Lanka until Bandaranayaka changed it in to Sinhala “with reasonable use of Tamil” (the part everyone forget to mention when they talk about this), and later on, Tamil also considered as national language.
This rare video on youtube is an interview with SWRD, where he states the "reasonable use of Tamil" part. He also admires Tamil as a "rich language with literature and so on".
1 comment:
Some argue that this decision made lives of Tamils difficult when it comes to dealing with the government. But that is far from truth IMHO. It is not Tamil that was replaced by Sinhala, it was English. Does this mean majority of the Tamils spoke English as their first language those days? I don't think so! I think some English speaking Tamil/Sinhala elites should be held responsible for creating this problem.
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