Political Hindi 'champions' emerge in Andhra minus desired engagement

Amaravati, Aug 26 (PTI) Hindi or non-Hindi, the issue which has been roiling across several states in India and even deteriorating into physical attacks in some places, has hardly mattered in the political landscape of Andhra Pradesh, but it is now finding traction here occasionally, owing to political leaders.

While the subject of language has affected large swatches of the country, especially in Maharashtra, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh has always been an oasis of calm, even before bifurcation.

Known for its stellar secularism and exemplary acceptance of other cultures and languages, Andhra has suddenly found new backers for Hindi from the TDP-led NDA government.

While English was the bone of contention among political leaders during the erstwhile YSRCP government, which promoted it between 2019 and 2024, Hindi is vying for attention now through Deputy Chief Minister Pawan Kalyan, Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu and others.

While commemorating the 12th formation day of Janasena a few months ago, Kalyan had launched a scathing attack against Tamil Nadu for "opposing Hindi" without invoking any names.

Taking a dig at the Tamil film industry, Kalyan had asserted that Tamil Nadu doesn't welcome Hindi but wants to make money from the Hindi heartland such as Uttar Pradesh and Bihar by dubbing Tamil movies into Hindi.

Addressing a recent meeting in Hyderabad, Kalyan, who has been unequivocally supporting Hindi recently, noted that opposing this language amounts to "limiting the development of future generations".

He went on to draw a peculiar parallel that Telugu is the mother tongue of the Telugu people and Hindi 'peddamma's (mother's elder sister) language', a reference that drew widespread criticism.

During his recent visit to New Delhi, Naidu, a key NDA ally, said that a time has arrived in India now where some people are questioning the need to learn Hindi but highlighted that multilingualism had made former prime minister PV Narasimha Rao great.

"A scholar (Rao) fluent in 17 languages; now we are all talking about why we should learn Hindi. Not only did he learn Hindi, he had learnt 17 languages. That is how he had become a great man," said Naidu about the former PM.

Defending his Hindi backing after his firebrand Janasena formation day speech Kalyan said on X, "I had never opposed Hindi as a language. I only opposed making it compulsory…" Anji Reddy, a political analyst, highlighted that Hindi is not going to have any political salience as far as Andhra Pradesh is concerned "as language politics has hardly had any role in the past century", despite the southern state being the first to be carved out under linguistic basis in 1953.

Telugu language has galvanised the people of AP for a separate state from the then Madras Presidency. Otherwise language politics have no role, said Reddy.

"So, when Telugu language itself is not a mobilising force, then there is no chance for Hindi to be an ideological tool in the politics of Andhra," he told PTI, adding that Telugu couldn't become a hegemonic force as far as collective identity is concerned.

According to him, Naidu and Kalyan may be using Hindi as a tool to 'please' the BJP, whose politics right from the beginning was about "Hindi, Hindustani and Hindutva".

In Andhra, caste plays an extremely important role, followed by the politics of welfare and politics of development to a certain extent, legitimising the politics of power in the years to come, he said, especially in a state where you find spoken English institutes but rarely any Hindi coaching centres.

YSRCP supremo YS Jagan Mohan Reddy expressing his opinion on languages observed that Hindi may be learnt but the medium of education should be English.

"Basically, the change what should be brought about is not Hindi. Hindi can also be a language (which) can be learnt. But the medium of education should be English. This is the biggest change that should be brought about throughout the country. If this country were to move forward and leap forward," he had said.

Calling English as the global language, he said unless and until all government schools change to English medium and "the poor students studying in them learn to speak fluent English, they can never be competitive".

R Narayana Murthy, renowned for revolutionary movies projecting the hardships of the working class and the poor, highlighted that lack of English knowledge has put scores of people at a great disadvantage when juxtaposed with students who are good at English.

"Poor people like us have failed (in life) for not knowing English…we became peons, attenders, clerks and soldiers…people who knew English, they became IAS, collectors, engineers, doctors, they became very great people," he added. PTI STH GDK SA