Reviving Indian languages for the diaspora across the globe

Pridhee Kapoor Gupta, Founder & CEO in her journey as a first-time mother (of parenthood) predominantly outside India, Pridhee quickly realized that there were not enough books in Indian languages to read to her toddler. She could find enough English books but not enough in her own mother tongue. Pridhee set about to correct this imbalance by writing and publishing books for young readers in Indian languages through T4Tales. A trained molecular biologist with a PhD from Germany, Pridhee has an undergraduate and master's degree from IIT-Delhi and has taught at Macquarie University, Australia. After trying out life in Germany, the USA, India, and Australia, she is now comfortably settled in Singapore. Here’s our exclusive Q&A with Pridhee about reviving Indian languages abroad via interactive storytelling.
As an NRI, how important do you think learning Indian languages?
Language plays the most pivotal role in the development of a child starting from when babies communicate to understanding how to express their feelings to learning new concepts in school. Therefore, in a school setting, this translates to most children speaking, reading, writing and listening to English. In these cases, the mother tongue takes a backseat. Introducing children to their mother tongue early on helps them have a strong identity and a sense of belonging to their culture.
Research suggests that bilingual or multilingual children are more empathetic towards other cultures and learning an additional language helps increase their brain power, and build problem-solving skills and memory building.
What can diaspora abroad practice (besides traditional tutoring methods), so that their children stay connected to their roots?
It’s simple - songs and stories.
Songs are the fastest way to get your children to pick up words in your mother tongue. Starting with simple nursery rhymes piques their interest easily. Stories, on the other hand, are easy to remember, and leave a lasting impression on kids. Reading them stories during mealtimes and narrating anecdotes from your childhood helps them relate to your experiences.
Additionally, a popular strategy that bilingual parents use is the “one parent, one language”. Bilingual schools across the world use a similar strategy for language immersion programs, with 2 teachers speaking 2 different languages.
Tell us a bit about T4Tales. How can Indians across the world use it to their benefit?
T4Tales’s vision is to help parents around the world introduce Indian languages to children in their early years through fun, interactive storybooks. We also want to keep alive verses and stories that are unique to Indian languages.
T4Tales hopes to help parents bring Indian languages to their children from the early years right alongside English. With books that are simple, easy to read and illustrated in a whole new format, we offer books ranging from nursery rhymes to mythological stories retold in a manner that’s more relatable.
All our interactive books are an all-in-one solution, where you support the development of fine motor, gross motor and language skills of a child.
In a world where English is the global language and speaking mother tongue is becoming more and more insignificant, especially for Gen Z, what is your take on the revival of Indian languages, abroad?
Firstly, a vast majority of Indians in India still speak regional languages. It is one of the easiest ways to connect to their grandparents. Also, given how mobile today’s generation is, it would be important to have a tool like a language to stay connected to your roots.
In many Indian households globally, though there is great emphasis on culture and tradition, language takes a back seat. By introducing interactive books at an early age and speaking in the mother tongue, young parents ensure better cognitive development and a certain grounding in children that only comes with their native language.