Political expediency has sadly triumphed over common sense. In today’s world the importance of English can’t be over-emphasized. Besides, in India English is the link language.
Here we have a situation where a section of UPSC candidates are refusing to be tested in rudimentary knowledge of the language and the government has weakly buckled under their pressure. Arguments like India was prosperous before English came to the country, as some BJP leaders are saying, are patently retrograde.
Also, the argument that bureaucrats in countries like Germany or Japan don’t need to know English is specious because none of them come close to being the multi-cultural, multi-lingual melting pot that India is. The government must recognize its mistake and take back its decision.