Although the Tamil Nadu government urged the Centre to make similar provisions for Tamil, the court rejected the petition, arguing that such a change would impact the transfer and posting of high-court judges across India. In 2010, a Gujarat court noted the false belief around India’s national language: “Normally, in India, majority of the people have accepted Hindi as a national language and many people speak Hindi and write in Devanagari script but there is nothing on record to suggest that any provision has been made or order issued declaring Hindi as a national language of the country.”Īdding to this misinformation and confusion, Article 351, a directive order, states that it is the government’s duty to promote the spread of Hindi, so that it serves as a way to express India’s composite culture.Īnother legal bias is reflected in Article 348(2) of the Constitution and Section 7 of the Official Languages Act, 1963, which allow Hindi-speaking states, such as Bihar and Rajasthan, to use Hindi in their respective high courts. However, the confusion began when, under Article 343 of the Official Languages Act, Hindi in Devanagari script and English were designated as the “official languages” - that is, languages used for official correspondence.įurther, the lack of an explicit notification stating that India has no national language led to confusion and space for falsehoods to thrive. Hindi is limited to particular regions in the country - just like Bengali, Gujarati, Odia, or Kannada. The Eighth Schedule of the Constitution makes note of 22 regional languages, including Hindi. The Constitution is largely silent on the issue of a national language. The argument and fervor around a national language - apart from being a political one - is also about history, culture, and the elusive idea of unity.
And Hindi, one of India’s regional languages, is not our national language. Logical fallacies aside (why will the nurses talk to the patients in a language they don’t understand?), the dispute further fueled the long-held misconception that Hindi is our national language - when, in fact, we don’t have one.Īs a nation, we are familiar with false memories. A hospital circular last weekend, later retracted, asked a New Delhi hospital’s nursing staff to not converse in Malayalam, because “ maximum patients and colleagues do not know this language.” They were advised to only use English and Hindi while talking to patients.