The Education Ministry has launched a programme to make teachers and students proficient in all three official languages - Sinhala, Tamil and English.

A pilot project titled "Thribasha" has already been launched by the Education Ministry together with the National Languages and Social Integration Ministry.

Director of Navodhya school branch at the Education Ministry, R. Pathirathne has said that teachers and school children would be taught two words daily from English and Tamil or Sinhalese, a language that is not their mother tongue.

Pathirathne has said the programme was being conducted in the Kandy District and would be extended to schools in all districts including the North and East.

The main objective of the programme is to ensure that school children from grade 1 to grade 5, including the teachers be trained in Sinhala, Tamil and English.

According to the Director, the Ministry is looking at training 1,000 teachers in all three languages in the second stage of the project.