Man uses language to communicate his thoughts efficiently. The efficacy of his communication depends upon the way he makes himself intelligible through his speech and writing. If the spoken and written parts of the language are mastered, thoughts can easily be transmitted. The first language or the mother tongue does not pose a problem since it is acquired naturally. However, the second language poses a serious problem, as exposure to it is not easily available. In this era of global opportunitiescommunication with mother tongue alone will not suffice and learning a second language becomes imperative. In the Indian context, that second language is English.

English is a ‘de facto’ link language in India, which facilitates communication with the world outside, too. The growing use and importance of English is indisputable. As such, competence in English has become essential in the modern age. The concept of global village is becoming more and more of a reality, and the knowledge acquired in science and technology through English has become quite common. The opening of new avenues in many fields of life has given an enormous impetus to the use of English. As a consequence, the study of English can neither be diminished nor ignored. Despite this growing use of English, it remains neglected especially in the rural parts of our country. The idea of language as a thought-transmitter has been undermined. It is essential to take up some measures to raise the standards learning such an important language.

In the rural set up, the student, in most cases, is the first generation learner, and hence no exposure to English in his family is possible. As a corollary, he is faced with unfamiliar grammatical structures, unknown vocabulary and unheard of speech sounds which are entirely different from his first language. When student with this background comes to college, he finds it hard to cope with the courses. Not surprisingly, his written language is incorrect even when he is at the undergraduate level. He must be given a chance to learn correct language habits and unlearn the language habits influenced by his mother tongue in order to enable him to communicate in English quite efficiently. This seemingly impossible task can become possible with mutual cooperation between him and his teacher. The student should be willing to learn and the teacher to teach need- based remedial courses to bridge the gulf between the proficient and non-proficient. The English teacher has to follow pragmatic and functional methods in administering abridge/crash course with confidence and commitment. She has to devote some extra hours outside the regular teaching hours and frame her own need-based courses after administering diagnostic tests to find out his difficulty level before she imparts communicative skills called LSRW, which stands for Listening, Speaking, Reading and Writing for competence in English.

Teaching LSRW is essential to make students proficient in communicative English. It is essential to give equal importance to each one of the skills described in the acronym. When deficiency is diagnosed and a new course is administered, the student, with the maturity of his intellect, should be able to acquire proficiency in English. The first two skills can be imparted by showing him how different his pronunciation of English is from his mother-tongue. To achieve this goal, he should be made familiar with the sounds of English and the pronunciation of each sound separately and in connected speech.

The crux of the problem lies in our education system, which is to be revamped to meet the challenges in the modern age. It has, hitherto, been ignoring these skills and emphasizing only on mastering writing skills without first learning the other basic skills!! In order to enable the student to write correct sentences, he should be made to read English books with correct pronunciation, acquire vocabulary and observe and absorb correct grammatical structures.

While these salvage remedies might be effective at the college level, it is necessary to assess the gravity of the situation at the grass-root level by probing into the condition of the teaching of English at the primary school level. An awareness of this situation should be created in the minds of both learners and their parents. The Department of Education should take steps to incorporate need-based syllabus in order to impart communicative skills right from the primary school level to prevent inefficiency in communicative in English at the college level. At the outset, it is necessary to probe into the linguistic-background of the weak students and teach them correct language habits. This can be done not only at the college level but at every school level whenever there is a linguistic problem in a realistic situation.

It is, no doubt, a formidable task to achieve the above objectives when the present program is not a part of the curriculum. The teachers, despite their readiness to help, feel dejected when their learners are unable to acquire proficiency in English. With the present system, teachers are usually driven by the need to complete the prescribed textbooks of the course within the stipulated time. So, some extra hours, outside the stipulated hours, are to be devoted for administering the need-based courses by applying innovative methods to meet classroom demands. A new syllabus, independent of university intervention, to meet the needs of the students is to be evolved and extra efforts are to be put in to bring about expected results.

As primary education is the nucleus for rural development, sound basic education, particularly to establish sound language habits, is to be imparted to the rural children. As it is said that primary school is the cradle of learning and that the seeds of habit formation are to be sown here, this stage is ideal for intellectual and physical development. The second language habits along with those of the first language will be formed here. So the primary duty of the parents and their English teacher at this stage, is to impart the first two skills, namely, listening and speaking, without ignoring the skill of writing. A graded course can be taught catering to the needs of the learners either at the primary or middle school level. Every effort should be made to make the students “unlearn” their wrong language habits and learn the correct ones. With such a revamping of our educational system which should enable us to acquire competence in English, India should be able to meet international demands with confidence and gusto.