Pradyot on Manik Sarkar’s ‘trapped’ remark: playing with tribal sentiments will have repercussions

In another tweet, he wrote that if Sarkar had “one inch of love” for tribals, he should demand that the current script be replaced with Roman for Kokborok in the Central Board of Secondary Education curriculum.

“Manik Babu you are right in one thing many people have tried and will try to fool tiprasa! Whether it’s me or a poor person in a village! Let me assure you neither you nor the powerful people sitting in power right now can fool the tiprasa anymore! If u have one inch of love for us the indigenous people speak for the exclusion of The current script and inclusion of roman script in CBSE,” he wrote.

An interlocutor has been appointed to mediate between the Motha and the central government.

Kokborok is the lingua franca of the majority of 19 tribal communities in the state. While the language has a long history, is recognised as an official language of the state under the three-language policy, and has acceptance among other tribal communities as well, it is yet to have its own script. Till now, Bengali or Roman script is used for writing the language.

Since the first BJP-led government was formed in 2018, there has been a push for introducing Devanagari or Hindi script, even as political parties, students, language activists and cultural workers are up in arms saying the move would not be tolerated and that it would disturb language dynamics in the region.

Pradyot’s Motha has been repeatedly demanding the introduction of Roman script for the language, while saying it was not opposed to using Bengali script along with Roman till the script debate is resolved.

Pradyot’s tweets were preceded by the communist veteran’s comments that the former was “caught in a trap”. “Now he has to think how he will get free from this trap. Why would I waste time talking about it? Let’s see what he says,” Sarkar told reporters Sunday, adding that it was improper to keep the state government in the dark about the interlocutor appointment and have a “third person” (Pradyot) announce its details.

The communists, who were seen hobnobbing with Pradyot and his party before the last Assembly elections, have been at loggerheads with the erstwhile royal family since the 1940s, when Leftist politics took shape in the state with the anti-monarchy Jana Siksha Andolan.