Hindi in Texas school district welcomed by Indo-Americans

This article was last updated on April 16, 2022

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Indo-Americans have welcomed introduction of Hindi, official language of India, in Hurst-Euless-Bedford Independent School District (HEBISD) headquartered in Bedford (Texas, USA) and urged it to offer other languages of India also.

Distinguished Indo-American statesman Rajan Zed, in a statement in Nevada (USA) today, commended HEBISD for offering Hindi and urged school districts around the country to offer Indian languages like Hindi, Bengali, Telugu, Marathi, Tamil, Gujarati, Kannada, Malayalam, Punjabi, etc., in their schools.

Rajan Zed, who is Chairperson of Indo-American Leadership Confederation, further said that besides learning the rich languages and culture of India, it would also make a good business sense to open-up the American children to these as India was on track to become a global power. Moreover, USA being a culturally diverse society, introducing languages of India would bring more cohesiveness and harmony in the communities. In addition, American children of India-descent would be able to keep their languages, traditions and culture alive and intact, Zed added.

“Today, China and India are powerful players in the global economy…Students in HEB ISD can get the competitive advantage by enrolling in Hindi or Mandarin Chinese classes”, district website states and lists Hindi among languages “essential to success in a global marketplace”.

Seventh, eighth and ninth graders are able to take these classes. These courses are part of the district’s International Business Initiative, which will set students on a course to success in college and in the workforce, HEBISD states.

Hindustani is reportedly the fourth highly spoken language in the world after Chinese, Spanish and English and has more speakers than Arabic, Portuguese, Russian, Japanese, German, French, Italian, Dutch, etc.

HEBISD, a K-12 public school district founded in 1958, has about 21 thousand students in its 26 schools spread in seven cities. It has sister schools in China and India, its pupils reportedly speak 72 languages, and about 51% of its students are economically disadvantaged. Faye Beaulieu and Ellen Jones are President and Vice President respectively of HEBISD Board of Trustees while Dr. Gene Buinger is the Superintendent.