A day after starting his second tenure as the president of the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK), Tamil Nadu chief minister M K Stalin on Monday told the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) led Union government not to “force another language war by imposing Hindi” while recalling the 1965 agitations across the state.
Stalin was responding to a report presented to the President of India, Droupadi Murmu by the Parliamentary Committee on Official Language chaired by Union home minister Amit Shah. He cited media reports that said the committee has recommended Hindi to replace English as the medium of instruction in all central institutions like the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), central universities and Kendriya Vidyalayas.
“To mandate a common language which is practically impossible is akin to stating that only Hindi speakers are the rightful citizens of India and speakers of other languages are second-class citizens. This is divisive in nature,” Stalin said. “The BJP led Union government has been continuously attempting to impose Hindi with utter disregard to the constitution,” Stalin said.
He also appealed to Prime Minister Narendra Modi to give up the attempts to make Hindi mandatory and uphold the unity of India instead.
{{/usCountry}}He also appealed to Prime Minister Narendra Modi to give up the attempts to make Hindi mandatory and uphold the unity of India instead.
{{/usCountry}}The Eighth Schedule to the constitution has 22 languages Including Tamil entitled to equal rights.
“We should strive to make all languages as the official languages of the Union government,” Stalin said. “In such a scenario, where does the need arise for Union home minister Amit Shah-led committee to recommend that Hindi be made the common language of India? Why is it recommended to discontinue English language question paper in the Union recruitment examinations to give preference for Hindi? It is against the spirit of the Constitution to provide undue, unfair advantage to Hindi and discriminate against other Indian languages while raising “Bharat Mata ki Jai” as a political slogan in Parliament,” Stalin said.
He added that the over all number of people speaking other languages is more than that of those speaking Hindi.
On September 14, speaking at the All India Official Language conference on the occasion of Hindi Diwas , Amit Shah said that Hindi language is not a competitor but is a “friend” of all the other languages in the country. “I want to make one thing very clear. Some people are spreading disinformation that Hindi and Gujarati, Hindi and Tamil, Hindi and Marathi are competitors. Hindi cannot be a competitor to any other language in the country. You must understand that Hindi is the friend of all the languages of the country,” Shah said.