Scottish Church College to teach Bengali language to foreigners through audio visual
Sanchita Chatterjee, BS News Agency Kolkata: At a time when the state's Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee is taking various initiatives to increase the use of Bengali language and is trying to protect the language rights of Bengali speakers spread across the world, the Scottish Church College, an ancient educational institution in Kolkata, has taken a great initiative to teach Bengali language to foreigners.
A new course "Come and Learn Bengali" has been started online in collaboration with the Bhaktivedanta Research Center. Interested people from any part of the world can participate in it. The aim of this project is not just to teach a few words or sentences, but to make foreigners fluent in Bengali language step by step. The course has been arranged in three levels:
Primary, Intermediate and Advanced.
College Principal Dr. Madhumanjari Mandal said that this proposal comes from the Bhaktivedanta Research Center. Many foreign devotees of ISKCON want to read Sri Chaitanya Charitamrita, Gita or Bhagavata Purana in Bengali. The plan to start the course was initially taken for them. It is worth noting that ISKCON founder Abhaycharanaravinda Bhaktivedanta Swami Srila Prabhupada (Abhaycharan Dey) was a student of Scottish Church College. Due to that, ISKCON devotees look at the college with special respect. Therefore, the college authorities accepted this proposal as soon as it came. However, the course will not be limited to only ISKCON devotees, anyone interested in Bengali language and literature can participate. There will be 24 one-hour classes at the primary level. MCQ type questions will be given to evaluate the students at the end of each class. Promotional videos and several audio-visual contents have already been prepared.
The inaugural ceremony organized on the college premises on Thursday was attended by the college principal Dr. Madhumanjari Mandal, vice-principal Dr. Supratim Das, nodal teacher of this course Vidisha Sinha, Dean of Bhaktivedanta Research Center Dr. Sumanta Rudra, two representatives of the United Board for Christian Higher Education in Asia
Dr. Meher Spurgeon and Dr. Sandra Joseph.
Dr. Sumanta Rudra said that not only devotees and followers of ISKCON but anyone interested in Bengali language and literature can participate in this course.