Common Mispronunciation in Indian Schools

The report on the School Final Examination of the United Provinces devotes considerable space to point out instances of mispronunciation. Among the more glaring errors detected in dictation were: (1) “Found of garden in” for “fond of gardening” (2) “Was often hurt shouting” for “was often heard shouting”. The Examiner also writes: “A certain number of boys wrote ‘cot’ for ‘cart’ which is typical of the common Indian mispronunciation of the letter ‘o’ in such words as ‘cot’; the ‘r’ in ‘cart’ and similar words is not pronounced by Englishmen but is only used to lengthen the ‘a’.” He adds: “Many schools suffer from lack of practice in hearing an Englishmen. In some schools the Joint Magistrate or the local missionary has come occasionally to give dictation.”