2 weeks Ago By Bharti Jain
NEW DELHI: Home minister Amit Shah on Saturday said Hindi must be made acceptable, flexible and conversational, and stressed on the need to promote it by strengthening all Indian regional languages and establishing their mutual congruence. Shah, while addressing the official language 's diamond jubilee celebrations and the 4th Akhil Bharatiya Rajbhasha Sammelan here coinciding with Hindi Diwas , said Hindi and other local Indian languages should complement one another. "There cannot be any competition between Hindi and other Indian languages.
..Hindi is a friend of all Indian languages.
..Hindi must be promoted not through a struggle or force but through general acceptance," he insisted.
Stating that only mothers can preserve Indian languages, the home minister on Friday called upon parents to speak to their children exclusively in their mother-tongue. He underlined that Prime Minister Narendra Modi too has, through the new education policy , stressed on imparting primary education in a child's mother tongue. Shah said Hindi Diwas is the day to strengthen all the languages of India and to make the official language the connecting language of the country, so that "we can carry out the work of our country in our own languages".
At the event, the home minister released the 'Diamond Jubilee Special Issue' of the 'Rajbhasha Bharati' magazine, a commemorative postage stamp and a commemorative coin. He also presented the Rajbhasha Gaurav and Rajbhasha Kirti Awards and launched the Bharatiya Bhasha Anubhag (Indian Languages Section) of the department of official language. Shah said the past 75 years have witnessed the acceptance of Hindi as the official language and preservation of "our traditions, culture, languages, literature, art and grammar by connecting all the local languages of the country through the official language".
He said that thanks to efforts to promote Hindi on the global stage, with then prime minister A B Vajpayee first having addressed the UN general assembly in Hindi and now PM Modi speaking at all international fora only in Hindi, Hindi has gone international and is adopted as a second language in 10 countries. The home minister said the Bharatiya Bhasha Anubhag will strengthen the bonhomie between Hindi and other Indian languages and ensure translation of all Centre-state official communication in each other's language. Already, he said, all the files of the two ministries under hime -- home affairs and cooperation -- are in Hindi.
He recalled how leaders like Dr Bhim Rao Ambedkar, C Rajagopalachari, Mahatma Gandhi, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, KM Munshi, Lala Lajpat Rai, Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose or Acharya Kripalani, hailed from non-Hindi speaking states but promoted Hindi, having understood that Hindi is a medium to unite the country. Underlining the efforts to promote Hindi, Shah said many Supreme Court verdicts are now translated into multiple Indian languages. Also, he said, Rajasthan, UP, Madhya Pradesh and Uttarakhand had made the entire medical curriculum in Hindi.
Work is underway to introduce an engineering curriculum in Hindi, Shah said adding that the language of research too shall soon be Hindi. Recognising the work done by the department of official language in making Hindi accommodative and acceptable, Shah said Hindi has effortlessly assimilated unique words from other Indian languages and vice versa. He said the Shabd Sindhu official language dictionary includes words assimilated from every language of India and may become the world's largest dictionary before the next Lok Sabha elections.
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