Christian missionaries gave India 'the gift of English'

National Catholic Reporter, Feb 25, 2005

NEW DELHI -- Anjali Mishra, 23, sets out for the office when others are retiring for the day. Dressed m trendy clothes, she and a group of young coworkers drive to an office complex in Gurgaon, a stylish suburb of New Delhi. There Mishra blends into corporate America.

Mishra is one of about 10,000 people doing similar work in scores of similar offices in the complex. They work all night collecting bills, selling phones and fielding consumer complaints for Western companies time zones away. She earns about $460 a month, more than her father, who has worked for nearly 30 years. Though she gives some money to her mother, most of Mishra's salary goes for clothes, movies and indulgences. She wants to buy a car.

"It is all because of my ability to speak good English," said Mishra, a Hindu graduate of a Catholic convent school. "My school education with the nuns made all the difference."

With leading global firms shifting offshore work to India, thousands of young people like Mishra are finding handsome jobs just by speaking English well. A sizable number of them are products of Christian education.

Every year, toward the end of February, church-run educational institutions in Bangalore--the southern city known as India's Silicon Valley--face an admissions rush. This year, for example, a convent school in this southern Indian city received 1,500 applications for 100 available kindergarten seats.

This demand does not surprise Stafford Mantel, a 34-year-old senior officer in a call center. He calls church schools the launching pads for the city's dynamic software industry.

"Our English has become a world beater," said Jesuit Fr. Thomas V. Kunnunkal. He once headed India's Central Board of Secondary Education, which oversees most of the country's English-medium secondary schools.

English "has given us a head start over China," said Kunnunkal, referring to the oft-cited competition between the two countries as potential destinations for business process outsourcing.

India has 18 official languages and 1,652 native tongues. Kunnunkal quotes a leading educationist, J.P. Nayak, in saying that Christian institutions "have given India English."