Odisha CM expresses anguish over Odia missing from milestones

Odisha Sun Times Bureau
Bhubaneswar, May 4:

While resentment among people of Odisha growing loud by the day, Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik today wrote to seeking his intervention to instruct the authorities to follow guidelines regarding inscription of Odia on kilometer stones and information boards on national highways in the state.

“It is a matter of grave concern that the local language Odia has mostly been ignored in place identification/destination boards and in the kilometer stones on the National Highways throughout the state. I am deeply anguished to find that the Ministry’s instructions are not being flowed in our state. I would request you to look into the matter and issue appropriate instructions to the concerned authorities to follow the guidelines scrupulously,” Naveen said in the letter to Gadkari.

Besides, there is a perceptible lack of destination and place identification boards inscribed in Odia script on the National Highways causing much inconvenience to the public at large, he added.

As per a notification issued by the Ministry on December 24, 2004, all information boards should invariably be inscribed in three scripts namely local, Devnagri and Roman and local language should be used in every kilometer stone in isolation on every second and fourth kilometer stones and in combination with Roman and 0^th and fifth kilometer stones in combination with Hindi on first, third and sixth kilometer stones.

Besides, the circular had clearly specified the dimensions of letters and numerical to be inscribed on the kilometer stones.

Worth mentioning, there had been outrage over the issue owing which people have vented out their agony on social media platforms. Twitterati had been recently tweeting to register their protest with #StopHindiChauvinism and #stopHindiImposition and urging for corrective measures.

Also Read: Social media outrage over Odia missing from milestones on NH in Odisha

Besides, a petition campaign was also launched in support of their demand to include Odia among other languages.