Sanskrit, the forgotten mother of most Indian languages, could make a comeback in school and college curricula in Bengal after years of disuse on the back of the Narendra Modi government’s back-to-roots policy.

The state government has started an assessment of the existing facilities for Sanskrit teaching and research in schools, colleges and universities in response to a directive from the Centre, which has set up a commission to prepare a roadmap for promoting the language of the Vedas and Upanishads across the country.

The state’s point man for the job, Jiban Chandra Chakraborty, state editor, West Bengal District Gazetteers, said the Centre’s letter (sent in August) “directed us to send a comprehensive report to the Second Sanskrit Commission on the current status of Sanskrit education in Bengal”.

The data received from the states will be collated to prepare suggestions to integrate Sanskrit with modern disciplines such as physics, chemistry, mathematics, medical science, law and architecture.

The letter came with a questionnaire for schools, colleges, universities, education boards and research institutes. Chakraborty said the institutions must return by December 15 the questionnaire filled in with appropriate answers.

Language experts said Sanskrit education had flourished in Bengal during pre–Independence but lost ground to Bengali and English over the past three decades. “Sanskrit blipped out of the radar after the Left Front government decided as a policy not to make it a compulsory subject at the secondary level,” said a Calcutta University professor.

Most of the universities in Bengal offer undergraduate and postgraduate Sanskrit courses.