Indian Union is a group of ethno-linguistic nationalities with their own languages and cultures.
Indian Union is a group of ethno-linguistic nationalities with their own languages and cultures.
TeaAfter the meeting of the Official Language Committee chaired by Union Home Minister Amit Shah, a debate has erupted once again on the imposition of Hindi. Recommended to make Hindi the medium of instruction in central institutions of higher education in Hindi speaking states. The committee also proposes that central government employees be punished for not knowing Hindi, making Hindi practically the only official language of the central government. In the past, Mr Shah suggested changing Hindi to English link language, and be made the working language of the Central Ministries. Several leaders of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) have called for making Hindi the national language of India.
discrimination continues
According to the constitution, there is no national language in India. According to the Eighth Schedule, there are 22 official languages - Tamil for Tamil Nadu, Bengali for West Bengal, Hindi for Uttar Pradesh, Malayalam for Kerala, etc. – Hindi and English being the official languages of the central government. This already suggests a fundamental discrimination against non-Hindi speaking people as the mother tongue of Hindi speaking people is considered for the purposes of the Sangh but the mother tongue of non-Hindi speaking people is not. This makes some Indians more “Indian” than others. The recommendations of the Official Language Committee will deepen this existing discrimination on the basis of language.
The central government is dependent on the states for its revenue. Non-Hindi speaking states provide revenue to the central government which is more than the percentage of population in these states. Hindi speaking states survive on a cross-subsidy basis from non-Hindi speaking states transferred through the central government. Even for central universities and institutions such as the Indian Institute of Technology and the All India Institute of Medical Sciences, non-Hindi speaking states contribute indirectly and disproportionately. It will be a mockery of justice if the funds of non-Hindi speaking states are used for artificial development of Hindi at the cost of fundamental rights of non-Hindi speaking Indians. The imposition of Hindi is a direct attack on federalism and the principle of equal citizenship. Information provided online or on paper for recruitment examinations of Army, Border Security Force, Central Reserve Police Force, Staff Selection Commission etc. is available to Hindi speaking people in their mother tongue, but this is denied. Non-Hindi speaking people in their mother tongue. The central government spends 22 times more money on Hindi than on Bengali, Tamil or any other language.
Against Hindi imposition
Attempts to impose Hindi have been challenged by non-Hindi speaking people across India. The first such protest was organized by EV Ramasamy ‘Periyar’ in August 1937 to protest the decision of the Congress government led by C. Rajagopalachari to make Hindi compulsory in secondary schools in Tamil Nadu. In the Constituent Assembly, members of the Hindi-speaking provinces even claimed that those who do not know Hindustani (Hindi) “have no right to live in India”. The language movement in Manbhum district led to the division of the district between Bihar and West Bengal and Purulia district was born in 1956. Later, protests broke out in Tamil Nadu against the introduction of Hindi as the sole official language of the central government. This forced the central government to amend the Official Languages Act for the use of English until all non-Hindi speaking states agreed to drop it. Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) has been the most vocal organization fighting against Hindi imposition. This strong stand has been used by Hindi fundamentalists to brand Tamil Nadu as an aberration. However, similar anti-Hindi protests have now arisen in states such as Karnataka, West Bengal, Kerala and Maharashtra.
In the light of the changing demographics of the country, if parliamentary seats are re-allocated, it will exacerbate the fiscal disparity between Hindi speaking and non-Hindi speaking states. The scheme goes along with the continuous attacks of the central government on the rights of the state.
Along with the boom in India’s service sector, the success of the educated Indian diaspora was made possible by the proficiency of Indians in English. The contact language of the world is English. The beauty and stability of India lies in its plurality and unity in diversity. Any attempt to destroy it by imposing a language would be a threat to the unity of India. You can have either unity or uniformity; You cannot have both. The Central Government should understand that the Indian Union is a group of ethno-linguistic nationalities that have their own languages and cultures and allow them to live in peace.
Garga Chatterjee is the Secretary General of Bangla Pakkho; “Salem” Dharanidharan is the spokesperson of the DMK and the executive coordinator of the Dravidian Professional Forum.