Hundreds of tribals organised a sit-in demonstration in Agartala on Wednesday demanding the adoption of the Roman script for the tribal Kokborok language, the second official language in Tripura.
The agitation was spearheaded by ‘Roman Script for Kokborok Choba’ (RSKC), an apex body of 56 small tribal organisations.
Holding placards and banners and chanting slogans in support of their demand, the agitators said that the Kokborok script issue has been pending for over five decades, and accused the previous and current governments of failing to take the matter seriously.
RSKC convenor Mintu Debbarma claimed that several commissions, formed earlier to decide the script for the Kokborok language, had recommended the Roman script but the government has remained silent on the matter.
The protesters cited a recent RTI (Right to Information) reply that revealed more than 99 per cent of Kokborok-speaking students prefer to answer their examination papers in the Roman script when given the choice between Bengali and Roman.
Noting that no one can be compelled to use the Bengali script, Debbarma said that the Roman script must be used by nursery to university students and they should be permitted to answer in the Roman script in all levels of examinations.
“If the government fails to promptly address this issue, we will have no choice but to escalate our agitation across the state,” Debbarma added.
Tripura has a 12 lakh tribal population out of its 40 lakh inhabitants and 70 per cent of the tribals spoke in the Kokborok language, which was recognised as the second official language by the then CPI-M led Left Front government in 1979.
The demand for the Roman script for Kokborok recently got strength after there were reports that students in various schools in Tripura, specially the Central Board of Secondary Education run schools, were compelled to write answers for the Kokborok subject in the CBSE board examination in the Bengali script.
The main opposition party — the Tipra Motha Party — has also been spearheading agitations across Tripura demanding the introduction of the Roman script for Kokborok.
Some Kokborok speakers favour Bengali, while the majority of the tribal intellectuals and academicians advocate for the Roman script.
Since 1988, two commissions have been set up under former tribal leader Shyama Charan Tripura and linguist and academician Pabitra Sarkar.
For over five decades there has been a debate over the use of the Bengali and Roman scripts for the Kokborok language.
The BJP government in Tripura last year handed over 100 government run schools to the CBSE under the Vidyajyoti scheme.
A leader of the Tipra Motha Party said that Kokborok is the mother tongue of the tribal people and it belongs to the Tibeto-Burman family and is close to other languages of the northeastern region such as Bodo, Garo and Dimasa.
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