IIT-Hyderabad workshop: Technological support for MLE
IIIT-Hyderabad recently hosted a multi-day workshop focused on low-resource Indian languages, as noted by Prof. Sandeep K. Shukla. The institute organised Bahu Bhasa 2025 (6–8 Nov 2025), a major event that brought together technologists, linguists, community leaders and policy stakeholders to reimagine the future of Indian languages in the digital age (Deccan Chronicle). This mix of research and public dialogue connects language-technology efforts (Natural Language Processing – NLP, speech, language resources) to India’s broader educational goals. These activities not only represent a strong technical and institutional push, but also directly support multilingual education (MLE) by addressing the urgent need for accessible, high-quality learning tools in children’s home languages. By building datasets, speech corpora and NLP tools for under-resourced languages, IIIT-H is making a contribution towards scalable MLE in India’s many first languages.
Why does this workshop matter for the MLE landscape in India? This workshop brought together many organisations working on MLE across the nation. They presented posters on their areas of work, the languages they work with, their initiatives towards mother-tongue preservation, and also some challenges they may be facing. Some projects build digital and AI resources, like the Khasi POS Corpus and Bhasha AI, helping future apps and dictionaries in tribal languages. Others focus on online revival, such as Kashur Praw for Kashmiri and Rekhta for Urdu, keeping these languages active on the internet. Many groups work through school materials and children’s books, like the Mundari, Koya, Dawdi and Santali initiatives, which make learning easier in the mother tongue. Open platforms like PARI and Tulu Wikimedia share stories and knowledge online, while tools like Pratham’s ‘PadhaAI’ and ‘Swecha AP’ offer free digital support for learning. These varied efforts show that both technology and community resources are essential for strong mother-tongue MLE in India.
By institutionalising language research (via the Language Technology Research Centre) and holding recurring events, IIIT-H could create a sustainable pipeline of researchers, developers and projects focused on Indian languages. This sustained capacity is necessary to move from pilot efforts to scalable solutions that can be integrated into state and national educational systems.
One key challenge is that technology by itself cannot improve mother-tongue education. Even if tools and datasets are created, they only help students when teachers know how to use them, when textbooks and lessons are adapted to local languages, and when communities support learning in the mother tongue. Another challenge is continuity: a workshop or one-time project is only the beginning. To truly strengthen MLE across India, these initiatives must be followed by long-term pilots in schools, proper funding, regular monitoring, and strong partnerships between governments, researchers and communities. Without these steps, language technology remains an idea—not a real change in classrooms.
In conclusion, India’s many languages need protection through local efforts that create books, digital tools and language data to support learning in children’s mother tongues. Initiatives like the IIIT-Hyderabad workshop are important because they help connect these community needs with language technology. When more Indian languages gain digital support and teaching materials, MLE becomes stronger, and children can learn with confidence in the language they speak at home.
Regards,
Karsten, in collaboration with Upasana Lepcha
Resources:
Photo source: https://x.com/iiit_hyderabad/status/1986731262724477418/photo/4