Nimal Samarasinghe

This rejoinder sent to Sunday Island to articles appeared there criticizing changes post 56 was not published.

The articles on English language in your Sunday issues are intriguing.

Today I play a senior professional role in my occupation in the kingdom of the English.

I obtained a credit pass at my English O/L and the required level at the ILETS.

However my entire education was in Sinhala up until entry to the University.

Though I had some initial difficulty that was overcome by the necessary application.

I am correct if I say I owe my current position to the post 56 changes brought into education.

I found it much easier to have my primary and secondary education in my mother tongue that was our only line of communication in the family at home.

By the time you come to Uni education you have developed the skill set needed to tackle any such challenge.

Do not forget many students have to learn a foreign language during their overseas Uni course.

If that the case why not English for us, I wonder.

Wales have a population around three million.

Many schools  teach primarily in Welsh particularly where many people speak Welsh everyday

though London is only a couple of hundred miles away by road.

Sign boards are in most places in both languages.

Those who point Sinhala is used only by a miniscule of world population should see the patriotic aspiration of a much smaller nation just on the borders of London. 

Don’t we have that ourselves?

The English education was not available to the vast majority in the country.

The change in language policy while English continued to be taught enabled the youth in the remote areas of the country to enter the universities correcting a social anomaly.