On January 23, 1968, against the backdrop of Parliament passing the Official Languages (Amendment) Act, the first DMK government, headed by C.N. Annadurai, adopted a resolution in the Madras Assembly scrapping the three-language formula in the State. The resolution decided that Tamil and English alone be taught and Hindi be eliminated from the curriculum of all the schools. The decision taken in the middle of the academic year had placed hundreds of other language teachers in a piquant situation.
“The wonder expressed by the school authorities and teachers is how the Government, which has given immediate effect to the switchover, will tackle the rehabilitation of over 4,000 teachers, who are now teaching Hindi and Sanskrit in about 2,400 schools in the State,” wrote a correspondent of The Hindu in the days immediately following the adoption of the resolution.
