Which one of the following is true of the three language formula?

Concept: The Three-Language Formula (NEP 2020, para 4.12, continuing the 1968 national policy) is India's framework for which languages a student studies through school, applied flexibly by states and regions so that a learner is exposed to at least three languages by the end of secondary schooling, with at least two native to India. NEP 2020 pairs this with a related provision (para 4.11) that the medium of instruction should, wherever possible, be the child's home language/mother tongue/local language in the early years. Pedagogy exams such as CTET commonly present these two NEP 2020 provisions together as one combined picture of multilingual education policy.

Application: NEP 2020 pairs the home-language medium-of-instruction principle (para 4.11) with the three-language formula's staged later additions (para 4.12). Reading the four statements against this combined picture: schooling that begins in a child's own mother tongue or home language, and progressively adds two more languages by the end of secondary school, reflects both provisions together and is the description CTET's official Paper II (2024) answer key records for this item.

Cross-check — an independent look at each other statement's own claim:

• Pairing English together with the home language as the very first medium of instruction does not follow NEP 2020's own wording for the early years (para 4.11), which specifies the home language/mother tongue/local language for that stage — not English.

• A state's officially designated language is a single administrative choice, yet many states hold several linguistically distinct communities within them — a single state-wide language does not describe every child's schooling uniformly.

• Hindi's status as one of the Union's official languages is an administrative designation at the national level; it does not by itself mandate which language a given child's schooling begins in, particularly outside Hindi-speaking states.

So the combined NEP 2020 provisions, as keyed by CTET for this item, describe schooling beginning in the mother tongue/home language, with two more languages progressively added by the end of secondary school.