Malda, Dec. 18: Learning English from the primary level is a must and the Left Front government is determined to make school syllabus modern and pragmatic, state finance minister Asim Dasgupta said here today.

“Students must learn English along with the mother tongue. The language should not remain restricted among the affluent only. While taking English classes, the teachers should speak the language,” Dasgupta said.

The minister advised borrowing cassettes and CDs of spoken English from British Council to learn the perfect pronunciation.

The irony perhaps was not lost the minister’s audience, as it was the same Left-run government that had stopped the teaching of English in state-aided primary schools decades ago. It was re-introduced from Class I in 2003.

Dasgupta was here to inaugurate the week-long 150-year celebration of Malda Zilla School of which he is an alumnus. “Our motto is to reach education to all. Meritorious students are born in poor families also. We should give them equal opportunities. The syllabus load is being lowered with an eye to discouraging students’ growing dependence on coaching centres,” he said.

The scholar from MIT said his “best time and education were” in the district school. The teacher in him made him take a class. He threw questions on maths to the students. Dasgupta thanked Agniban Goswami of Class VIII who had given the correct answers to the questions.