The Central Institute of English and Foreign Languages being a National Institute provides higher education in English and other Foreign Languages in India. It controls the functions of Educational Media Research Centre, CIEFL (Hyderabad) which came into being in 1985.

The institute has the purpose to make quality higher education accessible to students of small and remote places utilizing the rapidly expanding television network in the country. It is the only university in India devoted to learning and teaching of English and other foreign languages.  It offers courses in English, Arabic, French, German, Japanese, Russian and Spanish. There are three units of CIEFL located at Hyderabad, Lucknow and Shillong.

Functional Areas

The functions of Center for English and other Foreign Languages are in the following areas.

• Teacher Training
• Trainer Training
• Oral Communication
• Business Writing
• Technical Writing
• Public Speaking and Making Presentations
• Interviews
• General Proficiency in English
• Editing Documents

Projects undertaken by CIEFL

• Test (NELTS Test)
• International Training Programme
• Government of India Schemes (GOI Schemes)