[lg policy] Annadurai on dangers of Hindi fanaticism

[Harold Schiffman]

Annadurai on dangers of Hindi fanaticism
December 27, 2017 22:46 IST
Updated: December 28, 2017 00:35 IST
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The Chief Minister of Madras, Mr. C.N. Annadurai, has expressed the view
that if the Centre had only introduced the Official Languages (Amendment)
Bill without the resolution as amended in accordance with the Congress
Party’s recommendations it would have been certainly of some help to
non-Hindi-speaking people. Mr. Annadurai said although the Bill itself was
watered down, it was helpful to the extent that it did not try to do away
with English within a specified period and it gave the right to the
non-Hindi-speaking people to continue using English. This was better than
what existed previously. But the resolution in a sense tried to take away
by the left hand what was given by the right hand. The provision relating
to the use of either English or Hindi for competitive examinations would
seriously put the non-Hindi speaking people at a disadvantage. Mr.
Annadurai who was talking to your correspondent said that the Government
could have solved the problem by a very simple measure providing for the
continued use of English. Apparently, a detailed Bill and a resolution
resulted in pressure from Hindi-speaking people. What seemed to have been
forgotten by those who put pressure and also yielded to pressure was that
the Bill was meant only to implement the assurances given by the two former
Prime Ministers to the non-Hindi-speaking people. It was because of the
Madras Government’s persuasion that the Official Languages Amendment Draft
Bill, which was circulated to the States, and which was an elaborate one
including almost all the provisions in the resolution on the language
policy, was later split up into a Bill and a resolution.

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 Harold F. Schiffman

Professor Emeritus of
 Dravidian Linguistics and Culture
Dept. of South Asia Studies
University of Pennsylvania
Philadelphia, PA 19104-6305

Phone:  (215) 898-7475
Fax:  (215) 573-2138

Email:  haroldfs at gmail.com
http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/~haroldfs/

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