Is the Language Policy derailing the nation building process in India?

Many will be surprised to know that in the first general election in 1952, after the Indian independence, Congress that led the independence movement, failed to get absolute majority in Tamilnadu, as the several parties, banking on the support generated by the  ‘separate Dravida Nadu’ demand of ‘Periyar’EVR, won significant number of the assembly seats. Worse, tempting few of those parties to defect, under the initiative of Rajaji, Congress formed the first government in TN, after the independence.

Interestingly, before the independence, Rajaji supported the  ‘separate Dravida Nadu’ demand of his friend ‘Periyar’EVR, who entered into the public life, under the influence of Rajaji.

The demand for the separation of Tamilnadu (then Madras Presidency) from India even before the independence, gained unbelievable support, due to the imposing of Hindi by the then CM Rajaji, as the following article, rightly, explained.

“In 1937 when the Madras Presidency under C Rajagopalachari insisted on a compulsory learning of Hindi in the State, the Dravidian movement spearheaded by the Justice Party of E V Ramaswamy (popularly called Periyar) got a major campaign agenda. They vehemently opposed this imposition, and the agitation went on for three years before it was revoked in 1940.” (https://swarajyamag.com/culture/the-language-genie-put-it-back-into-the-bottle-for-the-sake-of-national-unity )

The anti-Hindi steam sustained the anti-India sentiments in Tamilnadu, which was exploited by Rajaji’s U-turn w.r.t Hindi, to support 1965 Anti-Hindi agitation, joining hands with the DMK leader C.N.Annadurai, resulting in dethroning in 1967, not only the Congress party, but also all the national parties from TN politics; forcing them to survive as the ‘tails’ to the Dravidian parties; apart from discontinuing the voluntary learning of Hindi in TN schools.

Unfortunately ‘Periyar EVR’s opposition to the 1965 anti-Hindi agitation & his experiencing the humiliations in the agitations, were not subjected to objective debate, which might have revealed the reasons for the failure of the nation building process in Tamilnadu. Without encouraging such debates, worse, ‘Periyar’ parties in TN, now resort to ‘thug’ style (காலித்தனம் in EVR’s words) agitations. (‘The Dravidian Movement & Rescuing Tamilnadu’ ; http://tamilsdirection.blogspot.sg/2014/10/normal-0-false-false-false-en-us-x-none_10.html ) 

I doubt if the language policy of the Indian govt, takes into account, the threat to the nation building process, due to the imposition of Hindi on the non-Hindi speaking people.

Had the first war of Indian independence 1857 succeeded, India would now be under the rule of more than 50 kings.

Ignoring the above fact, the nation building process, after the Independence, was subordinated to the dynastic vested interests of Nehru family (http://tamilsdirection.blogspot.sg/2016/10/caution-bjps-support-to-strengthen.html ) ;

spreading the dynastic infection to the regional parties, including DMK.

The failure in the nation building process was mainly responsible for the growth of the chauvinistic regional parties and the separatist groups; in turn weakening the soft power of the government & forcing the employment of hard power as witnessed in Kashmir, which, in my view, would have prospered like Sikkim, minus the mischief from Pakistan.

Encouraging the role of the mother tongue in education, administration, and social life, will help the nation building process; resulting in a socially conducive environment, in which, the encouragement to learn other non-mother tongue Indian languages including Hindi, Sanskrit, etc will work.

Imposing Hindi not only will derail the nation building process (cautioned well by most of the TN members in the constituent assembly debates; “This kind of intolerance makes us fear that the strong Centre which we need, a strong Centre which is necessary will also mean the enslavement of people who do not speak the language of the legislature, the language of the Centre. I would, Sir, convey a warning on behalf of the people of the South for the reason that there are already elements in South India who want separation and it is up to us to tax the maximum strength we have to keeping those elements down, and my honourable friends in U.P. do not help us in anyway by flogging their idea ‘Hindi Imperialism’ to the maximum extend possible.”- T.T. Krishnamachari; http://www.languageinindia.com/april2006/constituentassemblylastdays.pdf ) ;

  
but also will cause a kind of pyramid like infection to even the regional languages, to ‘destroy’ the other mother tongue languages, under the ‘misused power’ of the regional languages, as explained below.

“But interestingly this concept of linguistic imperialism runs right down the pyramid. For instance, the oral languages and dialects of Karnataka like Beary, Tulu, Kodava, Konkani, Siddi, Hakki Pikki which are oral languages bereft of scripts, feel terribly threatened by the hegemony of official Kannada, which in turn fears a Hindi, which eventually is intimidated by English!” (https://swarajyamag.com/culture/the-language-genie-put-it-back-into-the-bottle-for-the-sake-of-national-unity )

Anti-India steam in TN acquire boosting, whenever TN Tamils visit countries like Singapore & Srilanka, raising the question why Tamil, unlike such countries, in the administration of the Indian central govt, should continue the inferior status. The steam get additional boost, when they visit European countries, China & Japan, where the mother tongue dominates in the education, administration & social life.

W.r.t the anti-India steam in TN, I like to draw the attention of the pro-Tamil Hindutva supporters to probe, if the Archelogy & Linguistics related central govt departments in Mysuru & New Delhi, discriminate against Tamil, Tamils & Tamilnadu, as the following link suggested.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SgB9hgHhEIE

If the above allegations are true, PM Modi government need to act to rescue Tamil, Tamils, & Tamilnadu; as I fear that such unattended discriminations will lead to the future separation of Tamilnadu, headed by political thugs, misusing the Tamil sentiments & transforming TN to decay more like African countries, looting the remaining natural wealth, & safeguarding MOSTLY the non-Tamils in TN (http://tamilsdirection.blogspot.sg/2016/09/1967.html  )

The depoliticizing of TN politics, due to the corrupt rule of the Dravidian parties, had forced all the political parties to survive with ‘directly or indirectly benefitted’ ‘party workers’(?), alienating the college students and youth, as the Chennai Merina ‘Jallikkattu Support Struggle’ demonstrated; Also the ‘media projected’ Tamil poets/writers/orators (mostly anti-Hindutva), who directly or indirectly ‘benefit’ (?) by developing ‘mutually beneficial links’ (?) with such political thugs, are either alienated or disrespected by the college students & youth; also in the alienation process, anti-Hindutva in TN becoming (may be with few exceptions) synonymous with corruption. 

In fact, thanks to the above alienation, the selfish agenda of the Dravidian parties disabled their potential to exploit the anti-Hindi steam in TN. Also thanks to ‘the Sasikala phenomenon’, the Dravidian parties corrupt rule of TN will end soon. Hence the Modi govt is now having a ‘buffer time’ to initiate concrete steps, to influence TN to enter into the Indian unity stream, to rescue Tamil, Tamils & Tamilnadu. 

The mother tongue language based identity of the individual, excluded in the nation building process, will not only derail the process but also destroy it in the long run; as my research had revealed that unknowingly ‘Periyar’ EVR, decrying mother tongue based education, encouraged western-English mania in TN, divorcing the values based cultural roots of the Tamils, leading to thugs dominating in the public life. 

I shall not be surprised if any study revealed that the period of accelerated corruption in public life in India, and the period of accelerated growth of the English medium (commercial) education in Tamilnadu, were the same, and also inter-related.  

From social dynamics point of view, one must be aware of the contradicting social forces both within the pro-Hindutva as well as anti-Hindutva circles;

& objectively sense the vested interests in operation, both within the pro-Hindutva as well as anti-Hindutva circles;

to play a constructive role for the welfare of all the people in the country.

Hence BLIND support to pro-Hindutva or anti-Hindutva, may force us to play unconsciously socially destructive role.   

The developments in Natural Language Processing (NLP) could be employed to empower all the languages of India in education, administration and social life, ensuring a strong nation building process.  

Will Modi Govt wake up to include the NLP based language policy in the agenda of the Digital India?

 Note:  'Why Karl Marx on castes in India, Noam Chomsky on Nandigram and Amartya Sen on Modi, were wrong?' ; http://veepandi.blogspot.sg/2017/06/why-karl-marx-on-castes-in-india-noam.html