Bhubaneswar, Sept. 3: Bhasa Surakshya Sammilani, which works for the growth and protection of the Odia language, today announced it would organise a civil disobedience movement on September 21 here against the state government's apathetic attitude towards the cause of Odia.

Sammilani's convenor Baishanab Parida said: 'The chief minister has assured to constitute the language commission and introduce penal provision in the act. Despite the assurance, no action has been taken so far. It expressed the state government's apathetic attitude to the cause of the Odia language.'

At the organisation's meeting today where the disobedience programme was decided on, eminent personalities including former judge Hrudyaballavha Das, teachers Arabinda Patnaik, Nityananda Satpathy and Ajit Mohanty, linguistic Debi Prsanna Patnaik, CPM leader Sibaji Patnaik, former ministers Panchanana Kanungo and Ganeswar Behera and BJP leader Purna Chanra Mallick took part.

Parida said only if the Odisha government constituted a language commission could the Odisha Official Language Act 1954 be enforced in the state.

'Only a Language Commission can supervise whether official work is done in Odia or not. The language commission should be given the status of a quasi judicial body,' he said.

Parida said a software should be developed for the administrative machinery and government employees should be trained how to do file work in Odia.

'Though the chief minister announced to implement the law regarding executing official work in Odia, it is yet to be implemented,' he said.

Taking a dig at the founder-chairman of Bhasa Andolana, Subhas Chandra Pattnayak, who, in his interview to The Telegraph, had alleged that Parida was raising the issue now because he had been denied a ticket by Naveen Patnaik for the second time to the Rajya Sabha, Parida said: 'It is me who has been raising the issue since 2005. I have been organising the movement across the state. In support of the issue raised by me, people have sent more than one lakh post cards to the chief minister.'

'I don't want to join forces with Pattnayak as it would spoil our movement,' Parida said.