The decision to start language training centres under the Language Training Centre-2 project under the education ministry’s Secondary and Higher Education Division has not seen the light of day in the last four years. As a result, equipment worth Tk. 200 million is gathering dust.
Reportedly, this has happened due to the indecision of the ministry. Senior secretary of the department of secondary and higher education, Md Sohrab Hossain, says: “Maybe it’s stuck somewhere, I will look into it.”
The project, called, Language and ICT Skill Development Project, LIDSDP, was conceived to develop skills among workers going abroad.
There is also plan for the establishment of a Sheikh Hasina Institute of Language and ICT to reinforce the project.
Ministry sources say that the language to be given preference are English and Arabic.
At a cost of Tk 190 million LFTC-2 project was taken in 2012 and under it, 31 language labs were established at 29 post graduate colleges, government madrasas and at the International mother language Institute.
While training was on, thirty thousand people took courses in English, Arabic, Korean and French.
The project was included in the fiscal years of 2016, 2017, 2018 in the government’s Annual Development Plan, ADP, but was omitted in the 2018-19 fiscal year.
As a result, the language training of 30 centres under FLTC-2 became stagnant. In such a condition, equipment worth Tk 200 million is rusting and the future of the project looks uncertain.
The work for establishing the Sheikh Hasina Institute of Language and ICT did not begin.