Daijiworld Media Network - Bangalore (SP)

Bangalore, Jun 25: The High Court, which has expressed its anguish in no uncertain terms over the failure of the concerned in the implementing Kannada as the official language in the state even after 40 years of the reorganisation of states on linguistic basis, has asked the government to take stern steps on the officials who have failed in discharging their duties on this front. It noted that the needful has not been done in Kannada implementation even after 35 years of passing the Official Language Act.

The High Court bench headed by Justice N Kumar, which had taken up a case filed by Hassan Sri Kannika Parameshwari Cooperative Bank against an English notification issued on September 22, 2005 by the then registrar of cooperative societies K H Gopalakrishna Gowda about bringing cooperative institutions under the purview of the rights to information act, took serious objections to the said officer's statement in the notification that the Karnataka Souharda Cooperative Act is a 'public authority'. The High Court termed the notification as having been issued without applying mind and that the registrar in question failed in his duty in doing so.

It lamented the fact that the state still relies on English language and observed that standing atop the Vidhan Soudha and shouting slogans for Kannada will not be able to do justice to Kannada.