Deer as ‘dear’, vegetable as ‘vegitable’: The old problem leading to new mistakes in English teaching in Punjab

A photograph of a government school classroom in Punjab sparked a political controversy when Opposition leaders noticed spelling mistakes. The words "deer" and "vegetables" were incorrectly spelled as "dear" and "vegitables," respectively. This incident came to light as education minister Harjot Singh Bains highlighted Punjab's "Sikhya Kranti" or "Education Revolution," claiming the state ranked highest in school education in the country, even above Kerala according to a NITI Aayog report.

This latest controversy is not the first of its kind. Nearly a decade ago, during the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) and BJP alliance government, teachers were responsible for teaching English, despite their lack of expertise. In 2015, over 80,000 Class X students failed the English board exam, and the education minister himself, Dr Daljit Singh Cheema, conducted a 'class' to demonstrate the poor performance of language teachers.

The teachers made numerous spelling errors, such as vacent for vacant, shuld for should, lake for lack, and eaght for eight.

In 2016, the Punjab School Education Board (PSEB) granted 25-30 grace marks in English to help reduce the number of failures. Prior to 2007, there was no separate cadre to employ specialized English teachers. Social studies and Punjabi teachers, lacking any English expertise, were tasked with teaching the language to students in classes 6 to 12.

It wasn't until 2007-08 that around 1,000 master cadre posts for English teachers were created, but many schools still lacked qualified English teachers, with other subject teachers filling in.

In 2010, the Punjab government admitted in a High Court affidavit that there was no provision to hire English teachers before 2007. In 2016, a history teacher even took the Punjab and Haryana High Court to court against the Punjab education department for being forced to teach English. It was only in 1999-2000 that English was introduced as a subject at the primary level in government schools, previously only being taught from Class 6 onwards.

The current AAP-led government has taken some steps to address the issue, including hiring English teachers and collaborating with international organizations like the British Council and US Embassy's Regional English Language Office (RELO) to improve teacher proficiency. They have also introduced a special curriculum in government schools to enhance students' speaking, writing, and listening skills in English.

However, some critics argue that the promotion policy, where non-expert English teachers were promoted to lecturers, is flawed and needs to be re-evaluated.