Thiruvananthapuram: After almost a decade, the Malayalam alphabet has been included in the textbook for Class 1 as well. It appears in the Volume 3 of Malayalam textbook which Class 1 students received as the schools reopened after the Christmas vacation on Tuesday.

However, several schools also received Class 1 Malayalam textbooks without the alphabet as the Volume 3 books from last year’s stock were distributed.

The state textbook officer Tony Johnson said that directives were given to the textbook hubs in the districts to add the special page on alphabet to the textbooks from the old stock. Steps would be taken to immediately add the page to the books in areas where the glitch was reported, he said.

Last year, the Official Language Committee-recommended alphabet was included in the Volume 2 of Malayalam textbooks for Class 2.

From the next academic year, 2023-24, the alphabet would be included in the Volume 1 of the Malayalam textbook for both Classes 1 and 2.

The Malayalam alphabet was excluded when the curriculum and textbooks were revised in 2013. Writers and linguistic experts had urged the government to reintroduce the alphabet in the books. The new textbook, as per the revised curriculum, would be rolled out only in 2024. But the early inclusion is as per the directive of General Education Minister V Sivankutty that the alphabet should be added to the existing textbook itself as a special page.