A mother forgotten!

The origin of the language in written form is traced back to the 2nd millennium BCE.

It consists of 52 letters in total, 16 vowels and 36 consonants. These 52 letters have never been tweaked or altered and are believed to have been constant since the beginning, thus making it the most perfect language for word formation and pronunciation.

The language is like an endless ocean without a base due to its reach, complexity, and hundreds of words to express a single meaning or object. The language is so vast that it has more than 250 words to describe rainfall, 67 words to describe water, and 65 words to describe earth, among other descriptions.

Yes, you guessed right, it’s the mother of all language’s, Sanskrit.

But here is something you don’t know, as of 2020 there are 2,360,821 total speakers of Sanskrit in India. And our population as of 2020 is 1.3 billion and growing which just leaves us with 0.17% of people aware of a treasure our country possesses.

Keeping aside the scientific and coding benefits of Sanskrit language in the world of artificial intelligence which are still a subject of research and a result of less understanding of us humans of the great language it’s still a language worth preserving.

Are you thinking what I’m thinking, yet? So why the less numbers? Why people don’t want to inculcate the language or are curious about it? The answer is our education system; to learn a language a kid starts from nursery! And then they gradually proceed to near perfection not even perfection by the time they reach the end of primary education, which is atleast more than five years.

Sanskrit as language is thrown at a kid’s face when there are only three to two years for the school to finish off, it’s also the time when we are introduced with even more complex subjects with algebra, geometry, partial physics, so if you expect a kid to opt for an altogether new language when kids are already consumed in the hellish rat-race of getting good grades, kids are obviously going to take the short-cut.

If spontaneity is a problem, then continuity is a solution! Let the kids explore when their learning instincts are high, adaptability is more and getting good grades is not the kid’s only goal. They’ll then have five years to decide where their interests lie. Sanskrit as a language is vast but the same way we have segregated every language in order for the kids to understand like - English, Hindi, Marathi, Urdu. It’s just appropriate for us to do the same for the mother of languages. We conserve extinct species of animals and plants not to forget herbs also preserve the world heritage sites then it is just as right working towards conservation the great language we have.

-Nishita Patil