Recently, the Uttar Pradesh Assembly announced that proceedings of the House would be available in four regional languages as well as English.
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‘Language politics’ has defined the course of developments in Uttar Pradesh in the past week with the Assembly in session and Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi visiting his parliamentary constituency, Rae Bareli.
The Congress leader injected language into his politics of social justice during the two-day visit on February 20-21, accused the ruling BJP and its ideological mentor RSS of attempting to prevent marginalised people from learning English. Describing the language as the “biggest weapon”, he said it is a tool of mobility that allows someone to go anywhere, be it Tamil Nadu, Japan or Mumbai, or work in any company.
“People belonging to the BJP-RSS say that one should not learn the English language. They want you not to learn English because they don’t want Dalits, Adivasis and the poor to come where it is used,” Mr. Gandhi said addressing a ‘Dalit Dialogue’ in Rae Bareli. The local MP, however, added the caveat that Hindi is also important and “it is not right to cut off your roots”.
Ironically, the addition of English to the list of languages the proceedings in the House are translated led to accusations on February 18 by the Opposition of “English imposition”.
As soon as Assembly Speaker Satish Mahana announced that proceedings would be available in four regional languages as well as English, Samajwadi Party MLAs led by Leader of the Opposition Mata Prasad Pandey rose to their feet. “I oppose English being imposed upon members in the House. By promoting English, you are weakening Hindi,” said Mr. Pandey, who went on invoke the long history of his party’s opposition to English.
This elicited a retort from Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath. “You send your kids to English-medium schools but don’t want the same facility for others,” he said.
Regional diversity
The government is also seeking to give space for regional diversity in the Hindi-majority State by allowing legislators to speak in dialects such as Awadhi, Bhojpuri, Bundeli and Braj in the Assembly from the present session. It has also established academies for each of these dialects.
In addition, the government introduced translations in these dialects of Assembly proceedings, but that led to Opposition accusing it of indulging in divisive politics by leaving out Urdu, the second official language of the State.
Mr. Pandey led the charge. “Why is the facility not in Urdu? If English is included, so should Urdu.” The CM sought to turn the tables saying, “SP members want to promote Urdu to make the children maulvis. You people want to take country towards fanaticism.”
“Adityanath forgot that Urdu is an Indian language by origin and deeply associated with the freedom struggle,” SP spokesperson Ameeque Jamei told The Hindu.
Published – February 23, 2025 01:32 am IST
