Why did the Left Front government in West Bengal abolish English from primary school after coming to power in 1977? Please comment. Naimul Hossain Mallick, Burdwan, West Bengal The Left Front government had implemented a policy that only the mother tongue should be taught at the primary level of school. This was because the overwhelming opinion of educational and linguistic experts was that a child should be taught primarily in his or her mother tongue at the primary level and this was the best way for a child to learn. After the primary stage, additional languages could be taught and children would have the capacity to learn languages easily at that stage. Based on this understanding, the Left Front government introduced Bengali, or, the mother tongue as the sole language to be taught in primary schools. However, after some years, it was found that a growing number of people wanted English to be taught at the primary stage. This was because English continued to be taught in the private schools at the primary level and also the fear among many middle class parents that their children would suffer in their higher education and future careers if they do not have sufficient grounding in English. Given this growing demand for English to be taught at the primary level, the Left Front government introduced teaching of English in the primary stage in a phased manner. Though the approach of teaching in the mother tongue in the primary stage in a country like India, where literacy levels were low was valid, the continuing dominance of English created a situation where popular demand for teaching of English arose and the government had to take that concern into account. Party Constitution (as currently available on the Net) indicates about auxiliary groups (clause 2) that "Party Committees should arrange for the education and training of such auxiliary group members about the Party Programme and basic policies, so as to equip them in a reasonable period of time to be capable of joining the Party as candidate members." Is it not more reasonable to specify the time-span instead of just indicating "reasonable period". I think there exist chances which could stretch this waiting period upto several years. The Constitution has specified "one year" as far as promoting candidate members to Party members is concerned. Asit Sengupta, Kolkata The Rules under the Constitution which you have quoted specifies that members of an auxiliary group should be equipped and trained “in a reasonable period of time to be capable of joining the Party as candidate members” The Central Committee in December 2005 issued guidelines about the recruitment of auxiliary group members and their functioning. In it, it was stated that “A minimum period of six months may be fixed for entitlement for recruitment as candidate members” The understanding being that an auxiliary member should be in an auxiliary group for at least six months before being considered for candidate membership. Normally, the maximum period for auxiliary membership should be one year. Between six months to a year should be sufficient time to provide the member the requisite training to qualify for candidate membership. It is not a correct practice to keep someone in an auxiliary group for years.