As per the census, India also boasts 1, other languages. The bottomline, according to Gusain, is that since , Indian language policy has focussed on promoting regional languages rather than taking up the issue of a single official or national language. What is the case for Hindi as an official language? It is not only the most-common language in India, but also the fourth-most spoken language in the world. More states and Union Territories speak Hindi as the second language — as many as 14 in total — compared to 12 states where it is the first language.
Since pre-Independence, this has been the most repeated argument in favour of Hindi as the sole official language, if not the national language. The supporters of Hindi language further decry English as a symbol of slavery, which divides the nation into elites and the far-larger vulnerable masses. The argument here is that an indigenous, well-developed language ought to be a far better option than the language of the nation that had long subjugated India.
A more statistically backed argument is that while other languages in the country may be declining, Hindi speakers are growing. In contrast, the number of people who speak any of the four largest Dravidian languages — Tamil, Kannada, Telugu or Malayalam — are steadily dipping. Is the government pushing this agenda? The Modi government has made no bones about its preference for the Hindi language.
Soon after the party came to power in , the home ministry's official language department had issued a controversial circular asking all ministries and departments, public-sector undertakings and banks to give prominence to Hindi on official social media accounts. It had also announced a cash reward for those employees who do most of their official work in Hindi. Then, in , the draft National Education Policy — before it was revised and rolled out last year — set off a wave of protests in South India over the perceived imposition of Hindi as a third language in schools.
This sparked off protests from regional parties as well as the Twitterati, who saw it as an attempt towards Hindi imposition while undermining regional languages. Little wonder then that his latest tweets on Hindi Diwas are a lot more moderate.
Why is the non-Hindi speaking belt up in arms against this? The most effective argument against Hindi as a national language is that it would give only a smaller part of the country an unfair advantage in terms of jobs — especially in public services — and educational opportunities. Critics also cite India's diversity to state that since there is no single language spoken by the majority in India, one language cannot possibly become the uniting factor.
Although Hindi is the most widely spoken language in the country, it does not enjoy a majority in the language stakes. Moreover, its relevance is seen to be mostly limited to the Hindi hinterland. Experts point out that over the years, the Census has subsumed several dialects such as Bhojpuri, Rajasthani, Haryanvi, Marwari, Chhattisgarhi and many others for administrative convenience, which artificially beefs up its share.
For the record, Hindi has about 60 regional dialects, many of which predate the language as well as the works of Tulsidas, Kabir and Amir Khusrow. Last but not the least, the huge budgetary allocation each year for promotion of Hindi as official language is the cause for deep-seated and widespread resentment.
Is there a case for English as a middle ground? Given that India has still not been able to realise its dream of arriving at a single official language acceptable to every single citizen, and that English is the most-spoken language in an increasingly multicultural world, many push the case of making English the only official language.
There is a desire to learn English because people see value in doing so. Newsletter Exclusive news delivered to your inbox. Lost In Translation. Jun 12, Share. Image Credit: Depositphotos. Tags identity language Lost In Translation. See all articles by Saumya.
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At the outset, a brief discussion on the difference between a 'national language' and an 'official language' would be beneficial.
A 'national language' is representative of the country, its cultural heritage and history. It gives the impression that citizens of the country know and speak that language. An 'official language' on the contrary is used for the official purposes of the Union and the state governments i.
A country can have more than one official language, however national language is one. The administration in India was run in the English language under the British rule. The Constituent Assembly had the task of deciding whether to continue the same or abandon it for a different language, primarily Hindi. The discussions around the same were extremely heated. Mahatma Gandhi during the freedom struggle had described Hindi as the national language and called for its adoption.
He understood Hindi as Hindustani i. His opinion resonated with the Constituent Assembly as well. However, with the partition of India the cause of Hindustani was lost, though Mahatma Gandhi believed that a language which was spoken by the largest group of people should be adopted. Hindi although spoken by the largest single group of people, was not spoken in all parts of the country.
Therefore adopting the same would have seemed like an imposition on the others. The Assembly was divided on this issue and it seemed that this debate would result in breaking down of the Assembly's unity.
Therefore, a compromise called the 'Munshi-Ayyangar' formula was evolved and accepted. It stated that for a period of 15 years, English would continue to be used for all official purposes and the parliament could substitute it later with Hindi. However, the use of English for the first 15 years was allowed with an option of a further extension for a smooth transition.
In , as the period of 15 years drew closer, proposals to substitute Hindi in place of English were raised and met with threats of violent disturbances in the southern states of India.
This latter variety looked to Sanskrit for linguistic borrowings and Sanskrit, Prakrits, and Apabhramsas for literary conventions. It is this variety that became known as Hindi. Hindi and Urdu have a common form known as Hindustani, which is a Hindi-Urdu mixed language. Historical and cultural processes and the linguistic affinity that exists in Indian languages led to the emergence of Hindi-Urdu or so-called Hindustani as the lingua franca of major areas of India long before its independence.
Hindi was the language that was adopted by Indian leaders as a symbol of national identity during the struggle for freedom. Hindi has been used as a literary language since the twelfth century.
The development of prose, however, began only in the eighteenth century, which marks the emergence of Hindi as a full-fledged literary language. The modern representative of the corresponding Apabhamsa is Eastern Hindi, and the Chaurasia Apabhramsa of the middle Doab is the parent of Western Hindi.
Eastern Hindi is bounded on the north by the language of Nepal, and on the west by various dialects of Western Hindi, of which the principal is Kanauji and Bundeli.
On the east, it is bounded by the Bhojpuri dialect of Bihari and by Oriya.
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