Can Hindi be the ‘Uniting Language’ of India?

Ram Puniyani

September 19, 2019

Modi 2.0 has emerged as a very powerful Government. It has not only the numerical majority; it is also facing a weak and divided opposition. That is one of the reasons for it stream rolling over people’s opinions and imposing the agenda of RSS-BJP of Hindu nationalism in a blatant way. On one side it has brought in a law banning triple talaq, on the other it has revoked article 370. Encouraged by these easy successes, now it seems to be unfolding it’s other agendas one by one.

Speaking on occasion of Hindi day, the BJP President and Union Home minister Amit Shah went on to speak his party mind on the subject Hindi as the national language. Mr. Shah said, it was necessary to have one language which could represent India in the world…and that Hindi was widely spoken and could be the language to keep India 'united'…"To preserve our ancient philosophy, our culture and the memory of our freedom struggle,…there is at least one language, Hindi, that the nation knows. If Hindi is taken out of our freedom struggle, the entire soul of the struggle is lost." He tweeted this to emphasize his point: "I want to appeal to people to promote their native languages but also use Hindi to make the dream of Bapu and Sardar Patel of one language come true."

The intentions behind this statement were not so hidden though the language is very clever. The idea is to relegate English and regional languages to the margins and to give more prominence to Hindi all through. Sensing the intentions of Mr. Shah, many a leaders from South India, M K Stalin, Shashi Tharoor, Pinrayi Vijayan and Kamal Haasan have openly come against his statement. All of them see this as an attempt to impose Hindi on these states. Vijayan put it bluntly through his tweet, “That language (Hindi) is not the mother tongue of majority of Indians. The move to inflict Hindi upon them amounts to enslaving them.” While Kamal Haasasn, in a video uploaded with him standing next to the Ashoka pillar and the Preamble, says India became a republic in 1950 with a promise to the people that their language and culture will be protected. "No Shah, Sultan or Samrat can suddenly break that promise. We respect all languages but our mother language will always be Tamil… The battle for our language will be exponentially bigger…"

As such our country has been very diverse in all the matters related to language, culture, religion and ethnicity. The freedom movement was the real reflector of this diversity. People cutting across all these considerations stood as a single fraternity, respecting the diversity and the rich heritage coming from different religions and languages in particular. In all the languages, India’s aspirations of becoming a single nation got expressed. Hindi along with other regional languages have inherited rich lineage of becoming the mirror of Indian society. Though English was introduced primarily as administrative language, it soon became part of Indian culture, and all these also became a mirror of Indian society and aspirations.

In contrast to national movement for freedom from British slavery, which stood to reflect all the languages, the communal forces had different ideas. Muslim communalism came up with the slogan, ‘Urdu, Muslim, Pakistan’, and on parallel lines Hindu nationalism threw up the slogan, ‘Hindi, Hindu, Hindustan’. When Pakistan was formed in the Muslim majority areas (East Pakistan and West Pakistan) their languages were very diverse. Muslim League’s insistence that Urdu should become the national language of Pakistan did precipitate the feeling of separation of East Pakistan from West Pakistan leading to formation Bangla Desh with Bengali as the major language.

Interestingly the Constitution makers concluded that "Hindustani, written either in Devanagari or the Persian script at the option of the citizen, shall, as the national language, be the first official language of the Union. English shall be the second official language for such period as the Union may, by law, determine." The three language formula envisaged English, Hindi and regional language as the fulcrum of education. During sixties there was an attempt to introduce Hindi in Southern states, and this led to massive protests all over, with the result the policy was put on hold. Again with new Education Policy under consideration wanted to make Hindi as mandatory. The argument continues that Hindi is language of the majority of Indians. The latest data shows that it is mother tongue of 25% of Indians and 44% people say they know Hindi. The massive opposition to this language part of New Education Policy yet again led to holding back of Hindi as mandatory. One recalls that even during 1940s when Congress Government came to power in Tamilnadu (Madras at that time.), attempt was made to introduce Hindi there. The resistance to this was articulated by Periyar Ramasamy Naicker, who raised the slogan 'Tamil Nadu for Tamilians' and accused Hindi of being a tool of the Aryans for infiltrating Dravidian culture.

How does one deal with the complex language issue. Country has been running well with English, Hindi and regional languages being used in different proportions at different levels. While there have been conscious efforts to spread Hindi to Southern states, there are no parallel steps to popularize regional languages in Hindi speaking states. One must say Hindi has definitely made long strides in spreading into southern and other states all over the country but this task has been achieved not by impositions from top but by the spread of Hindi films, and popular Hindi serials apart from the efforts of organizations promoting Hindi.

Issue of Urdu as national language contributed to split of Pakistan. In contrast India has done a remarkable balancing act in matters of languages so far. The reorganization of states on linguistic lines has given a unique strength to us. With Amit Shah unfolding their agenda of imposing homogeneity all over, including in matters of language, one hopes this present sanity will prevail and sentiments and aspirations of all non Hindi speaking states will be given due weight age in deciding the national language policy.

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Karnataka’s Shilpa becomes Kasaragod’s first woman SP

coastaldigest.com news network

May 30,2020

Kasaragod, May 30: Karnataka origin IPS officer D Shilpa has been appointed the new Superintendent of Police of Kasargod district.

The 35-year-old 2016-batch IPS officer is the first woman SP of Kasaragod.

Her appointment follows the sudden transfer of P S Sabu who was hitherto holding the post. He has now been appointed as SP of Alappuzha.

Shilpa has earlier served as ASP of Kasargod. She was also ASP of Kannur during the 2019 Lok Sabha elections.

Shilpa was one of the three IPS officers assigned to Kasaragod with IG Vijay Sakhare during the first phase of covid lockdown.

A native of HSR Layout in Bengaluru, Shilpa holds a Bachelor's degree in Electronics Engineering and a Masters Degree in Business Administration.

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3 held for attack on ASHA worker in Bengaluru

News Network

April 2,2020

Bengaluru, April 2: At least three people have been arrested by police in connection with the attack on ASHA worker Krishnaveni in Bengaluru's Byatarayanapura area.

Earlier in the day, Bengaluru Police Commissioner Bhaskar Rao said that an investigation was initiated into the incident in which ASHA workers were attacked.

"I have appointed Pulikeshi Nagar ACP, Tabarak Fathima, to investigate the matter. A case will be registered and action will be taken. ASHA workers will be protected by the police to carry out their functions," Rao told ANI here.

Earlier, Karnataka Deputy Chief Minister CN Ashwath Narayan visited one of the ASHA workers who was allegedly attacked by unidentified miscreants and termed the incident as "completely demoralising" for the workers.

ASHA workers, who were deployed to spread awareness about coronavirus and identify suspected cases, were allegedly attacked by a group of locals in Byatarayanapura here on Wednesday.

The workers said that the locals did not allow them to work and around 100 people gathered at the spot and harassed them.

This comes as the country is under a 21-day lockdown to prevent the spread of coronavirus.

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28-yr-old woman in 8th month of pregnancy hacked to death in Bengaluru

News Network

May 12,2020

Bengaluru, May 12: Last week, a 28-year-old, eight-months pregnant woman, was found murdered at her house, in Diburahalli. The woman was hacked to death with a machete during the day and was discovered only after her family members returned home, later in the day. After the alleged murder, the accused tried to destroy the evidence, by cleaning the crime scene, and wiping the bloodstains off the walls and floors.

The victim was a homemaker and her husband is employed in the railway department. The police suspected that the murder was a result of someone known to the woman and family, and were soon proved right. The woman was murdered by her own brother-in-law, frustrated with her for allegedly not taking care of his mother and other family members properly.

The victim has been identified as Jyothi, and the accused is her husband’s brother Hareesh Babu, 38. “Jyothi and the accused are alleged to have had differences for the past few years. Their fights kept escalating over the years. She had also informed her family and her husband about the regular fights with the brother-in-law. The accused had been advised by the family, to back off from Jyothi. Owing to his violent streak, Babu’s wife had deserted him and their son. Since his wife’s departure, he had started troubling his brother’s wife and was regularly picked a fight with her.

He complained that Jyothi neglected to take care of his mother and other family members. Investigations reveal these as false allegations, and in fact, Babu’s son was being raised by Jyothi,” said an officer on part of investigations.

Last week, when the victim was resting at home, the accused returned home at around 10.30 am and picked up a fight with her. The fight escalated and Babu ended up hacking her to death with a machete. The victim’s father Nagaraj, at the time of filing a complaint, mentioned Babu’s regular fights with Jyothi and suspected his role in the murder of his pregnant daughter.

The accused, after killing her, had gone to the farm and pretended to not knowing about the the happenings back home. Based on the complainant’s suspicion, the police picked up Babu. After a thorough interrogation, Babu reportedly confessed to the murder of his sister-in-law. The machete, which was used for Jyothi’s murder, was also recovered by the police team.

A case of murder under section 302 of the Indian Penal Code has been registered and further investigations are underway.

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Put this case in fast track and hang him immediately. No mercy should be shown on such inhumans.