TN Assembly passes resolution against Hindi 'imposition'

CHENNAI: Tamil Nadu Assembly on Tuesday passed a resolution unanimously, moved by Chief Minister MK Stalin, against 'imposition' of Hindi and urged the Union government not to accept the recommendations of the Parliamentary Committee of Official Languages chaired by Union Home Minister Amit Shah.

"This House expresses concern that the recommendations of the Parliamentary Committee, now presented, are against the two-language policy resolution moved and passed by former chief minister CN Annadurai in this august House, contrary to the promise made by the then Prime Minister Nehru to the non-Hindi speaking states and are against the use of English as official language ensured by the resolutions passed in 1968 and 1976 on official Language,” said the Chief Minister, while passing the resolution

Recalling the report submitted by the Parliamentary Committee on Official Language, Stalin said that many recommendations made in the report are detrimental to the people of the non-Hindi speaking states, including Tamil Nadu, and are contrary to the promise made by Nehru.

Some of the recommendations of the Parliamentary committee on official languages are Hindi should be the medium of instruction instead of English in the educational institutions of the union government such as IITs, IIMs, AIIMS and central universities, to make Hindi the medium of instruction in all educational institutions of the Union government, including technical and non-technical educational institutions, and Kendriya Vidyalayas and in the employment of the youth, English language should be removed from the compulsory papers and only Hindi should be given priority.

Stalin said that he wrote a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi that the recommendations of the committee should not be accepted or implemented since they are against the federal principles of the Constitution, detrimental to the multilingual structure of our country and question the future by ignoring English and completely excluding the 22 State languages of non-Hindi speaking States, which are mentioned in the eighth Schedule of the Constitution.

Except for BJP, all the legislative political parties supported the resolution. BJP Legislative party leader Nainar Nagendran said that the Parliamentary committee in its report has made mother tongue compulsory in group-C states, which are non-Hindi speaking states, and said "I do not believe that the committee report will do any harm to Tamil,” saying so, the BJP MLAs walked out of the Assembly.