Amaravati, July 16 : Amid the raging debate over alleged imposition of Hindi, former Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister and YSRCP President Y. S. Jagan Mohan Reddy on Wednesday advocated the need for making English the medium of education across the country.

He said that if India were to move forward, English should be made the medium of instruction in all schools.

'The change that should be brought is not Hindi. It can be a language and can be learnt, but the medium of education should be English. This should be the biggest change if India were to move forward and leap forward,' he told media persons when asked to comment on the row over the alleged imposition of Hindi.

'English is the global language. Until and unless government schools change and students learn to speak fluent English, they can never be competitive,' said the YSR Congress Party (YSRCP) chief.

'Once the medium is established, you can have language one, two and three depending on the choice of the children,' he said, but hastened to add that mother tongue should be compulsorily the first language.

'As a second language, one can pick Hindi. There is nothing wrong with it,' said Jagan, who recalled that the first language in the school he studied was Hindi.

On the meetings of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana Chief Ministers in Delhi and the likely discussion on the Godavari-Banakacherla project proposed by Andhra Pradesh, Jagan Mohan Reddy said diverting surplus water from Godavari beyond Polavaram to Banakacherla becomes a question mark if Chhattisgarh goes ahead with the Indravati project and the height of Polavaram dam is restricted to 41.72 meters.

The former Chief Minister said the Chhattisgarh government was going ahead to harness the water of Indravati, one of the tributaries of the Godavari River. He mentioned that it has been declared a national project with the Central funding of about Rs 50,000 crore.

He expressed the apprehension that the project being taken up by Chhattisgarh would block Indravati, thus raising a question mark on the availability of surplus water in Andhra Pradesh.

The YSRCP leader also alleged that Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu has also compromised to restrict the height of the Polavaram dam to 41.72 meters instead of 45.72 meters. He stated that only if the water is stored at 45.72 meters, the surplus water can be diverted to the Krishna River. 'If not, the Banakacherla project becomes a question mark,' he said.

Jagan Mohan Reddy demanded that in the event of the Centre stopping funds for the Polavaram project beyond 41.72 meters, the state government should mobilise Rs 15,000 crore to increase the project's height to 45.72 meters.

/IANS