The Hindu Business Line : English

With China going all out to make its young people proficient in English, India's main advantage over China in terms of a large English-speaking population will not remain uncontested for long.

A few years ago, there was a claim from somebody in Kazakhstan that Unesco should declare him rightfully a national heritage. as he happened to be the only living person who could speak the official language of the 13th century empire of Genghis Khan, one of the largest empires to have existed in the ancient world. It was a remarkable revelation.

A fate like that, is unlikely to befall the English language. The country which gave rise to the British empire is being reduced to its original constituents of England, Scotland and Wales in nearly the same way the Mongolian empire had shrunk into Mongolia (republic) and the province of Mongolia in China. On the contrary, English bids fair to be the one lasting contribution of the former British Empire to universal history.

It is not only the lingua franca of the world's sole superpower but also the most widely used language of the European Union. But, more importantly, it is a leading medium of the arts and sciences of the world. There are times when the market has the decisive say and that market, whether for goods, services or financial flows at the global level, carries out its business largely in English. which is acquiring an increasingly wider currency and the standardisation of its use is becoming more and more difficult.

In the past, a foreign language was learnt either because it was obligatory or as an elite pursuit. But, today, a language like English is being learnt by millions of foreigners mainly because it is regarded as a skill that can be put to good use in a profession or in a country's business or industry. Thus, English today is either the second language or the preferred foreign language of several countries that count in terms of present economic performance or future potential. Of these, China and India top the list.

What is remarkable, however, is that both these countries, in spite of having their own languages of many centuries have accepted the usefulness of English in dealing with the world.

In the case of India, it has been more a question of sensibly retaining the role of English in important areas of national life; in China's case it was a conscious decision that was a part of the country's policy to open up and seize the opportunities of global economic integration. The three other Asian countries-Japan, Taiwan and South Korea that had preceded China in rapid economic growth followed a different approach to the language issue.The number of people learning English in China is truly enormous. According to a study by the British Council, half of all primary school children in China now learn English. British Chancellor Gordon Brown, during a visit to China two years ago, pointed out that an estimated 300 million people in China already spoke English and that in years the number of English speakers in China would exceed the global figure of those who have English as mother tongue. In India, the number of English-speakers is estimated to be 200 million. but the important fact is that between these two populous nations, the status of English as the most widely known language is assured.

The question of how far people in China and India use English as a basic skill becomes quite relevant in certain areas of competitiveness in a globalised economy. The domain of outsourced information technology and business process services is one as it offers easy access and important rewards to English-speaking knowledge workers. From call-centres to knowledge process outsourcing, it covers a swathe of global business activities, with scope for comparative advantage among developing nations.

The opportunities for China and India in the emerging knowledge economy would hinge on scaling up from low-end tasks to value-added processes where the basis skill represented by the capacity to use English language can be a significant element.

China's spectacular success, as a global manufacturing centre has not replicated itself in information technology and IT-enabled services, partly because of the deficiency in English knowledge resources. India, on the other hand, has become a leading exporter of outsourced IT and ITeS, with capabilities being further developed for comprehensive value addition in such services. Several IT majors actually rate the Chinese capability to match India's in due course. Even Indian companies such as Infosys have spoken of to the impressive strides the Chinese have been making in the IT industry. China is making rapid progress in learning English and should before long should bridge the gap in language skills.Learning English in China today has the character of a national campaign. Media report that ignorance of English is now being considered a matter of shame among Chinese students. When Beijing made its successful bid for the 2008 Olympics, the Government had promised that by the time of the event everyone in the capital would speak some English.

Clearly, India's main advantage over China in terms of a large English-speaking population is not likely to remain uncontested for long. The Chinese educational system is now making strenuous efforts to improve the employability of the professionally-trained manpower.

This could even be strengthened by what is becoming a systematic neglect of English teaching in several Indian states. This neglect is beginning to tell, especially with students from the rural areas and small towns. But the problem is by no means confined to non-urban India. The much-discussed unemployability of a large percentage of engineering graduates is partly related to their deficient English language skills. If India has any edge it is in what one might term, the eco-system for English language that exists in the country.

For a nation to derive full benefits from the use of English it should not merely use the language as a matter of choice in its international trade but use it also to work its domestic systems. By not being able to do so, China will always remain less accessible, transparent and communicative to the rest of the world than India.

The English that India uses in its daily life may hardly be the purist's version, but it is acceptable enough to the world, indeed, it is evolving into a recognised version of the language. As Prime Minister, Dr Manmohan Singh, said in a recent speech at Oxford, "People here may not easily recognise the language we speak, but I assure you that it is English".

Singapore's senior leader, Mr Lee Kuan Yew once said, "The defining test of a great power is whether it could produce not merely goods, but literature and songs for the rest of the world." To a rising India, the English that we speak and write gives that ability.

(The author, a former Indian envoy to several countries, is Professor at XIME, Bangalore.)