WHY the issue erupted now?

• All furore on speaking Hindi and its imposition began after Union Home minister Amit Shah’s comment that Hindi should be accepted as a “link” language in India, rather than English.
• Senior leaders across southern states namely former Karnataka chief minister Siddaramaiah, Kerala CM Pinarayi Vijayan, Tamil Nadu CM MK Stalin have expressed their objections towards Hindi being “imposed on” non-Hindi speaking states.
• Karnataka had also seen a series of anti-Hindi protests under the tagline ‘Namma Metro Hindi Beda’, where Hindi signages on the Bengaluru Metro were painted in black.

 Let’s go by statistics

• Hindi is the most widely spoken language according to the 2011 linguistics census report accounting for about 52.8 crore speakers which amounts to 43.6% of the total population and around 13.9 crore people said Hindi is their second language which account for another 11% which brings the total percentage of Hindi Speaking population up to 55% of the total population.
• Whereas English which is also an official language of the Central Government has only 2.6 Lakh speakers and is one of the 99 non-scheduled languages in India.
• The linguistic census report contains over 121 mother tongues which include 22 languages mentioned in the 8th schedule of the constitution, provisions for which are in Article 344(1) and 351 of the Constitution.
• The 8^th schedule of the constitution comprises of the following 22 languages: -Assamese, Bengali, Gujarati, Hindi, Kannada, Kashmiri, Konkani, Malayalam, Manipuri, Marathi, Nepali, Odia, Punjabi, Sanskrit, Sindhi, Tamil, Telugu, Urdu, Bodo, Santhali, Maithili and Dogri.

WHEN demand was raised to make Hindi as Official language of UN?

• In 2018, the then External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj had demanded the United Nations to make Hindi the official language.
• She argued that Hindi is a widely spoken language.
• Also, it is spoken in Fiji, Mauritius, Trinidad, Tobago and Suriname and the Indian diaspora all over the world knows the Hindi language.
• The inclusion of Hindi on the logic of being widely spoken, then in such a situation, Arabic language is spoken in 22 countries. Despite this, Arabic is not the official language of the UN.
• Both Hindi and English are our official languages. The differences regarding Hindi are not from today, but the foundation of its opposition had already been laid before independence.
• In 1937, a movement against Hindi was seen in the Madras Presidency.
• At that time there was talk of teaching Hindi in the South at the behest of the Indian National Congress.
• People protested for almost three years and protests also turned violent several times.
• Lord Erskine of Madras withdrew this decision after Congress's resignation in the year 1940.
• With independence, English was kept as the official language for a few years but several attempts were made to keep Hindi as the only official language.
• However, the then Prime Minister Nehru enacted the Official Language Act in 1963, according to which both Hindi and English are the official languages ​​of India.
• Fearing of dilution of this Act, protests from South India were reported again in 1965, But then PM Indira Gandhi assured or guaranteed not to do so in 1967.

WHERE the issue first eruptd?

• First  witnessed in 1937, when Congress government of C. Rajagopalchari in the Madras Presidency planned to impose Hindi on Tamilians, sparking massive protests and anti-Hindi demonstrations led by E.V. Ramaswamy Naicker (Periyar).
• The Madras government buckled down under the pressure in 1949.
• However, the language issue erupted again in 1965, on 26 January, when the day of switching over to Hindi as the sole official language as mandated by the Constitution approached. In the light of this event the anti-Hindi agitation gained momentum in Madras state with increased support from college students.
• Riots broke out all over the state.
• To calm the situation, the then Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri had to give the assurance that English would continue to be used as the official language as long as the non-Hindi speaking states wanted it to be so.
• Recently raised in the 37^th Parliamentary Official Language Committee by Home Minister Amit Shah.
• Hindi is the predominant language in North India in states such as Bihar and Madhya Pradesh.
• Hindi as an official language of the central government for communication and administrative purpose, along with English.

As per the constitution of India;

• Hindi is one of the two languages that can be used in the parliament, other being English.
• It can also be used in legislative assemblies along with official languages of the respective states & English.
• It has a role in judiciary as well, where in Hindi is one of the languages that can be used for all the official purposes in Supreme Court as well as the High Courts.
• For official communication with the Central government along with English.
• It can also be designated as official language by respective states.

WHO lays down the process to communicate between Central and state Govt?

• The Official Languages Rules, 1976 lays down the process to be followed for central government to communicate with other governments or organizations. 
• In view of the diversity of languages in India, and the various official languages used by the states, a need was identified to differentiate the nature of communication. Accordingly, all the states have been categorised into 3 different regions.
• Region A: Comprises of the states belonging to the Hindi Heartland, which have Hindi as their official language. (Bihar, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Uttarakhand, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh along with the Union Territories – Delhi and Andaman & Nicobar Islands) .
• Region B: Comprises the states of Gujarat, Maharashtra, Punjab and the Union Territories of Chandigarh, Diu & Daman, Dadra & Nagar Haveli)
• Region C:  All the other states which do not fall under the above two categories. These States do not have Hindi as their official language. This includes all the southern states, Odisha, West Bengal etc.

Exceptions

• With Region A: All the official communication between the Central departments and the State departments of the respective states needs to be in Hindi. In case there is any official communication made in English, it ought to be accompanied by a translation in Hindi.
• With Region B: The communication between the Centre and any department of the state would be in Hindi. If there is any communication in English, a translation in Hindi needs to be accompanied. In case, the communication needs to be sent in a local language, there is also a provision to send a translation in that local language along with the communication in Hindi or English.  Any communication which is sent to a person can be in Hindi or English.
• With Region C: All the communication which between the Centre and the state is carried out in English. Even communication with a person in this region will also be done in English. Tamil Nadu, is unique case and does not fall under any of the three regions. All the communication with Tamil Nadu is carried only in English

HOW Hindi had grown over the years ?

• From 1971 to 2011 five censuses have been compiled according to which Hindi has grown from 37% in 1971 speakers to 43.6% in 2011.
• Although these numbers can be attributed to the fact that in the most populous states in India like Bihar and Uttar Pradesh Hindi is the most widely spoken language.
• Another plausible reason might be that nearly 65 languages have been grouped under Hindi such as Bhojpuri which 5 crore speakers.

Growth Factor-

• The first method of the rise in Hindi is straightforward: population growth. India’s Hindi belt has rates of fertility which are some of the highest in the world while the corresponding figure in the South (as well as West Bengal and Maharashtra) is similar to developed countries, which are struggling with population decrease.
• This means the proportion of Indians who identify with Hindi as their native language is shooting up fast.
• Between 2001 and 2011, Hindi grew at a rate of 25% to add close to 100 million new speakers. Among the 10 largest languages in India, Hindi is the only one that saw the proportion of its speakers rise during this decade.
• Between 1971 and 2011, Hindi native speakers went up from 37% to 44% of India.

Migration

• Between 1991 and 2011, the number of Hindi native speakers in South India has nearly doubled. This, when the total population in these states has only gone up by 28%.
• Much of this increase is due to migration. And while absolute numbers are still small, the fact that migration would mostly be concentrated in urban centres means this rise would have a disproportionate impact compared to if it were distributed across the state. “The significant migration from the north means that Hindi is widely used in a place like Bengaluru.
• The census and the erstwhile Planning Commission projected India’s population at 1.4 billion in 2031.
• The growth rate of Hindi speakers from 1971 to 1981 increased from 27 per cent to 28 per cent – an increase of a percentage point.
• From 1991 to 2001, this increase was more moderate at 28.09 per cent – an increase of 0.25 percentage points.
• From 2001 to 2011, the growth rate of Hindi speakers started falling – from almost 28 per cent in the previous decade to 25 per cent. So the growth rate from 2001 to 2011 fell almost three percentage points.
• Now assuming that the growth rate of Hindi speakers continues to decline at the same pace – neither faster nor slower every decade, Hindi speakers would swell to 646 million in 2021.
• By 2031, their numbers would grow to 771 million – comprising 53 per cent of India’s population.
• For the first time since linguistic census began in India, would the number of Hindi speakers constitute more than half the population.
• By 2041, the number of Hindi speakers would touch 899 million – 60 per cent of India’s 1.5 billion population.

Decline in other languages

• While the proportion of Hindi speakers has grown from just about a third of the population in 1971 to 44 per cent in 2011, there has been a decline in 17 other languages. Four others – Punjabi, Maithili, Kashmiri and Bodo – have literally stagnated during this period.
• Some of the biggest decline has been witnessed in South Indian languages and certain Sanskritic languages like Bengali.
• In 1971, Tamil speakers accounted for almost seven per cent of the population. In 2011 they were down to six per cent of the population.
• No other language exemplifies the aggressive growth of Hindi better than Bengali. Bengali speakers – despite their numbers propped up by migration from Bangladesh post the 1971 war with Pakistan - have marginally declined from 8.1 per cent of the population to eight per cent.
• Bengali is the most widely spoken language in India after Hindi. Kannada speakers have declined from four per cent to 3.6 per cent.

Way Forward  

• A possible reason for the growth of Hindi speakers and declining proportion of regional language speakers in Southern states is migration triggered by better economic prospects down south.
• From 1993-94 to 2009-10, the number of poor people in Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan increased as their populations grew.
• Meanwhile states like Tamil Nadu and Kerala halved their poverty rates during the period. Clearly, people and their languages have migrated for a better life to South India and in the process have radically altered their linguistic composition.