Inaugurating a four-day symposium on `Tamil as a classical language', he said recent archaeological finds at Adhichanaloor in Tirunelveli district revealed that Tamil language was in use between 1500 B.C. and 500 B.C.
Tamil had all the attributes of a classical language. Ancient Tamil literary works such as Iymperumkappiyam, Pathu Pattu and Ettuthogai of the Sangam period could make a case for including the language in the classical category.
Mr Anbazhagan said every Tamilian was duty-bound to safeguard the language from being influenced by words from other languages in its written and spoken forms.
G. John Samuel, Director, Institute of Asian Studies, said the symposium was organised to bring together Tamil scholars living in various parts of the world and discuss the uniqueness of the language. The symposium would also discuss steps for making Tamil language a classical one at the global level.
Efforts are on to establish a Central Institute of Tamil for taking up higher level of research, said Udhayanarayana Singh, Director, Central Institute of Indian Languages, Mysore. The Institute was in the process of making 50 television documentaries on the Tamil language, which were in different stages of completion. The Institute had also started a Tamil online course to help those wanting to learn Tamil. Such an effort would also help in preserving the teachings of some of the greatest scholars.
C.N.A. Parimalam, chairman, Board of Governors, Institute of Asian Studies, spoke.
The programme was jointly organised by the Institute of Asian Studies, Chennai and the Centre of Excellence for Classical Tamil, Mysore.