Why is Hindi India's national language?
This question on The Sunday Times of India in its question-answer column called 'Open Space' made me curious enough to find out if the questioner, presumably a young student, has any links... Read The Article
Hindi and English are best rest all sounds tribal: ya-ba-da-ba-doo. If you don't like Hindi don't speak it, no body is forcing Hindi on you.
( Posted: Tuesday , January 16, 2007 at 18:19 )
Vinod bhaiyya...
100% support to ur statement !!!1
( Posted by AshutoshZ on Tuesday , January 16, 2007 at 19:16 )
Hindi and English sounds best for u since ur mother toungue might be Hindi and u would have learnt English for global communication.
The same implies for us also. for me Tamil and English sounds good and Hindi sounds like bla bla bla. Likewise for all peoples it would be Mother Toungue and English sounds good.
We are also thinking the same way as u do. If i ask North Indian to learn Tamil for atleast one yr will they accept it atleast in any one Hindi Sepaking state.
( Posted by Selva on Tuesday , January 16, 2007 at 18:47 )
selva bhai, thats exactly his point he did say speak whatever you like his preferencesare hindi and english...besides i sure hope you never have to leave amil nadu or the south becasue not knowing hindi would make it hard..vice-versa likelise
( Posted by ro on Wednesday, January 17, 2007 at 06:03 )
since its also "vice-versa", learn Tamil ro :)
( Posted by arun on Friday , January 19, 2007 at 10:58 )
vinoth
all hindi speaking people please think of onething... 50 years after indepenndence hindi has not allowed any language to enter into loksabha. People who has mother tongue as hindi are only eligible for high postings in central govt despite knowing more than 20 official languages of india People who know hindi doesnt bother to learn local language wherever they go film industry for example cannot be recognized unless it is hindi film Point to remember In IT era people are now not afraid of raising voices against language dilution as scenario is changed ,now govt cannot threaten saying hindi must for jobs as Globalization has given ways for non hindi speaking/english speaking public. Speaking hind is not patriotism as claimed by hindi belt.remember kalam dont speak in hindi but musharaff do. After 100 years india might face serious factionalism if hindi speaking peole dont accept other 23 official natinal languages are equal to hindi
( Posted: Tuesday , January 16, 2007 at 18:04 )
Devi gowda was the prime minister who barely could speak hindi...if i am not wrong the prime minister of our country does get elected from the lok sabha...there you go..need i say anymore???? Its great people no longer get jobs based on them knowing to speak hindi or not....but what kind of jobs need you to know hindi as a qualifying requirement can i ask? Now if in todays IT industry you were to not know english then you woudl be in serious trouble.
( Posted by ro on Wednesday, January 17, 2007 at 06:10 )
This is not true. In most cases people from non-Hindi speaking states have moved to Hindi speaking state and then they learned Hindi where as most people from Hindi state people moved for business purpose like Marwaris and they learned local langauge.
( Posted by Chandra Shekhar on Wednesday, January 17, 2007 at 01:25 )
kamikaze
It was a great mistake of the people from non-hindi belt in giving "whatever" status hindi has today. The politicians from the non-hindi belt should have been more strong and united to protect all regional languages and stop the hegemony of hindi. English should be the only medium of official communication and all other regional language including hindi should be put in the same status. It's true hindi-speakers are the most stubborn when it comes to learn some other language. I'm very much against the killing of the bihari workers in assam but this is one price they paid for never trying to mingle with the locals and to pick up the local lingo. Why should a non-hindi speaker spend time in learning hindi when english opens the whole world to us? Why blame tamilians for not learning hindi when in Delhi so many doesnot know even the roman numerals from 1-10?
( Posted: Tuesday , January 16, 2007 at 17:58 )
Well Said! British united this stretch of land from Kashmir to Kanyakumari, Gujarat to Sikkim. Before that it was all different people different independent nations. So its unpractical to expect one single common language.
Hatred is a strong word. Nobody hates any other language, people opposed the imposition of Hindi by the Central Govt in the 60s and also to be used for inter Govt communication. The Govt backed down and also let English continue and this helped us a lot some 40 years later.
Whether we like it or not, English has become the default lingua franca of the world, Chinese, Japanese and even the French are coming around and the schools kids are learning this unscientific language.
( Posted by JJ on Wednesday, January 17, 2007 at 01:31 )
S.Manohar
I totally agree with the author of this blog that the attitude of the Hindi speaking population towards the other languages is the main reason why people hate hindi today. They need to understand that when they go to someother place they need to FIT-IN by atleast making an effort to learn the local language instead of expecting the whole city to change for their cause.The samething holds true for others moving to hindi speaking areas, they need to pick up Hindi.I think the need of the hour is that we should be willing to change ourselves and make ourselves multi-lingual, at the end of which I am sure everyobe would be happy that they know one more language. I know many bengalis,marathis who pick up kannada/tamil in no time.All that is required is some small effort and respect for the other language. I dont think Hindi should be given the same status as regional languages in non-hindi speaking states. Land and language are integrated, that is how we have the present day state structure. This also makes sure that no language becomes irrelevant and that all languages have opportunity to propsper. Finally I don't think that hindi is hated so much after all......not all people down south hate hindi. But this may change if Hindi is thrust upon them in their own land.
( Posted: Tuesday , January 16, 2007 at 17:50 )
Overthefence
As I read more comments on this blog I see that we are becoming a nation. Let us understand facts
We are a nation comprising of Umpteen languages Umpteen relegious faiths Upteen skin color
We are a federal secular republic.
Still we have bloomed as a nation, which is a tribute to our leaders. Did our founding fathers ignore the realities of our diverse nation? A resounding NO
We have evolved an enormous number of strategies to overcome the problem. We have representation of all people We have a judiciary that really reflects our diversity and doesn't reflect lingual or relegious strengths We have armed forces which reflect the same We have an administrative services that reflects the same.
And rightfully our founding fathers chose not to impose a single language on the country.
Hindi was preached with great success by Hindi Prachar Sabha. My grand father is one of the contributors and as a family we are proud of our role in Hindi preaching.
We also know that the anti Hindi movement in Tamil Nadu, no way affected my grand father, his family or his work. The protestors treated him and his organization with respect. Members of the dravidian parties have been his students, though many would not accept it.
If our wise founding fathers (I don't see a leader of their stature, leave President Kalam) chose the path of preaching as against impositions, who are we to change that to imposition.
Leave non Hindi speakers to themselves, they will learn Hindi on their own, thanks to Bollywood.
If you demand that non Hindi speakers must learn Hindi, we will say GO TO HELL
( Posted: Tuesday , January 16, 2007 at 17:43 )
Dinesh
Why can't we have one common alphabets for all our regional langauges. Like Tamil can be written in Hindi alphabets and pronounced in Tamil. The problem is if I have to learn Tamil or for that matter any regional language I have to go to the basics of learing the alphabets. So why can't we get around it by introducing the Hindi alphabets to speak Tamil/Kannada/Telgu. Like in Indonesia/ Malaysia, the alphabets are in English but the pronouncation is in Indonesian or Malay. In this way atleast the people from Hindi speaking region can talk in Tamil or any south Indian language.
( Posted: Tuesday , January 16, 2007 at 17:35 )
Dinesh Malay /Indonesia adopted English as their scripts were more difficult to write ( like Bali / Java /chinese ).
But Tamil /Telegu/Malayalam/Kannada have thier own scripts and i think no need to use devanagiri scripts...
important is :- all hindi belt people should know to respect other's language and try to learn when they are in that language area ..
( Posted by Sen on Tuesday , January 16, 2007 at 18:21 )
marathi has paid a heavy price for sharing devanagari script with hindi. moreover you cant express all the alphabets of tamil language either in hindi(devanagari) script or in english(roman)script. these alphabets/sounds are typical for tamil alone. for instance take the alpahbet/sound 'akk' at the end of vowels. it is denoted by three dots which represent the three sides of a triangle as:
. . .
How you will represent in hindi or english? Though tamil script is the easiest among indian languages, some of its alphabets are unique to itself.
( Posted by perian on Tuesday , January 16, 2007 at 18:38 )
avinash
let us keep these indian languages aside for a while and try to analyse.what would lord.jesus say if he were asked why his mother tongue was aramaic and not an european tongue?similarly if you were to ask lord.shiva why he choose to teach tamil to sage.agastya the brother of vasistha?so this above topic can better be avoided and instead the languages appreciated for it's beauty.
( Posted: Tuesday , January 16, 2007 at 17:33 )
avinash
let us keep these indian languages aside for a while and try to analyse.what would lord.jesus say if he were asked why his mother tongue was aramaic and not an european tongue?similarly if you were to ask lord.shiva why he choose to teach tamil to sage.agastya the brother of vasistha?so this above topic can better be avoided and instead the languages appreciated for it's beauty.
( Posted: Tuesday , January 16, 2007 at 17:31 )
b.krishnan
Language a medium through which one can communicate and feel comfortable with it. One cant impose any language upon anyone. That is cruel. The southpaws learn any language since they are the most accmmodative and most tolerant but the hindi speaking indians are not. They are neither accommodatative nor tolerant hence the protest. And moreover hindi is the youngest language of all Indian languages and this certainly it hurts the other language speaking people
( Posted: Tuesday , January 16, 2007 at 17:29 )
Bobita
Why is Hindi India’s national language?
Hindi a national language? My foot. There is nothing called national language in India. Read what is the answer on The Sunday Times of India to the question raised by the blogger. It says:-
"Neither the Constitution nor the laws of India accord the status of national language to any language in India. Indian law states that no language will be made the national language unless and until all the constituent states of the Union of India accept it. Of the 28 states and seven Union Territories, only 10 states and three Union Territories have Hindi as the principal official language. However, Article 343 of the Indian Constitution states that the official, mind it, official language of the Union (India) shall be Hindi in Devanagari script. "
Now, should this shut the mouths of the Hindi belt?
( Posted: Tuesday , January 16, 2007 at 16:44 )
then which other language should be national language.
( Posted by sanjiv on Tuesday , January 16, 2007 at 17:52 )
Nobody is going to die without a "national language".
Let English be the "Link language" and the remaining regional languages be equally supported in the states.
The center can take care of the "minority languages" which are not the majority languages in each state.
( Posted by arun on Wednesday, January 17, 2007 at 04:31 )
Read Bobitas thread carefully. No language need to be a national language. If we must make a language the national language, then there are 15 in all their prurality. The baiyyas are going beserk today.
( Posted by CrackPod on Wednesday, January 17, 2007 at 02:05 )
hey thats something i didnot know. i recently heard two people fight about the superiority of the hidni language and i felt them really cheap and stupid to be doing that.there are enough reason why people are fighting and this seems the last and the sillest of reasons people should be fighting over. why cant people realise the value pof unity in diversity?and the person in support of hindi was calling it the national language. how funny that sounds now??!!
( Posted by supriya on Wednesday, January 17, 2007 at 02:07 )
i think no one will die if we make 15 different countries out of india. If we can live without a national language then we can without a common country too.
( Posted by sanjiv on Wednesday, January 17, 2007 at 14:04 )
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