Kamalanathan: Govt targeting 530 Tamil schools by next year

"The government will continue to promote Tamil education in the country and by next year, increasing the number of Tamil schools from 525 to 530.

"I am proud to say, that I will be officiating the opening of the 525th Tamil school next week in Taman Sentosa, Klang and the following week I will be going to Johor to see the 526th school built," he told Bernama on the sidelines after the 'National Open Competition on Tamil Language,' here on Saturday.

Meanwhile, Kamalanathan said the competition for students was to enable them to learn and appreciate the importance of the Tamil language, regarded as one of the oldest language by United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (Unesco).

He said, the competition was also part of the ministry's effort to celebrate 200 years of Tamil education which began as a section at the Penang Free School in 1816.

"Back in the day, the school (Penang Free School) which was set up by Christian missionaries, teachers from Tamil Nadu in India alongside with their education materials were brought in to teach Indian students, children of Indian labourers.

"Now, Malaysia happens to be the only country in the world with the highest number of Tamil schools, 50 per cent of Indian students in local universities are from Tamil schools.

"The Tamil school syllabus is the same as the national one and its state of the art infrastructure has helped in the development of Tamil education," he added.

He said the government took very seriously to uphold and preserve the Tamil language, thus allocation for Tamil schools would always be its priority.

Commenting on the 200 year celebration, Kamalanathan said a coffee table book will be produced by the ministry.

The deputy minister also added that a special stamp would be designed, and at the same time various debates and essay writing competitions would be held to create awareness among Malaysian students of various ethnicities on the Tamil language.