Guwahati, May 30: The UGC has included Bodo as one of the subjects in the National Eligibility Test (NET) with effect from the next examination to be held in June.

The commission has already made the Bodo syllabus available on their official website for the convenience of students.

NET is conducted to determine eligibility for lectureship and for award of junior research fellowship in order to ensure minimum standards for the entrants in the teaching profession and research. For humanities and arts subjects, NET is administered by the UGC while for science and engineering, it is jointly conducted by Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) and UGC.

The inclusion has been hailed by leading members of the Bodo community, which has been fighting for a separate state and development of the language.

Recognition by the UGC would be a big boost to its preservation and promotion, they said.

Swarna Prabha Chainary, head, Bodo department of Gauhati University, said before inclusion of Bodo in NET, students had to appear in the state-level eligibility test (SLET) to qualify for lectureship, and NET in folk literature to qualify for junior research fellowship. “Now, with the inclusion of Bodo in NET, students will be able to appear in their own language for the test for junior research fellowship to pursue research,” she said.

The Bodo language was included in SLET in 2003.

“The step will reduce efforts of the students to get a junior research fellowship as, from now on, they will be able to appear for the test in their own subject,” said Mridul Basumatary, who cleared the last SLET, held in June 2010. The next state-level test is being held on June 12.

General secretary of Bodo Sahitya Sabha, Kamala Kanta Mochahary, said the step would help the language and its literature to a large extent.

He said Assam University had included Bodo language as an honours subject in the colleges under it from this academic session and Dibrugarh University was also preparing a syllabus to introduce Bodo as an honours subject in colleges under it.

“Now, we will also approach the North Eastern Hill University to set up a Bodo department,” Mochahary said.

He said while the Centre had taken the initiative to include Bodo in NET, the state government had failed to do its part in the development of the language, as it had neglected to appoint teachers and distribute textbooks in the state schools.

Bodo was introduced as a medium of instruction at primary school level in 1963 and then at secondary level in 1968 in the state.

Moreover, Bodo language and literature has been recognised as one of the modern Indian languages in several universities like Gauhati, Dibrugarh and other universities of the Northeast.

In 1985, it was recognised as an associate official language of Assam.

The language also attained a position of pride with the opening of post-graduate courses in Bodo language and literature in Gauhati University in 1996.