India’s Lingual Legacy: Between Identity and Imposition

Shama Khanam

A Journey from Multilingual Pride to Political Prejudice

“In India, language is not just a medium, it is the warmth of a mother’s whisper, the power in a protest chant, the depth in a lover’s silence, and the soul of a people’s identity. To speak a language is to live a heritage.”

India’s Multilingual Soul: A Civilisational Truth:

India’s soul has always been multilingual. Long before nations were imagined or maps drawn, the subcontinent echoed with voices in myriad dialects from the deep resonance of Tamil Sangam poetry to the soft cadences of Kashmiri folk verses, from the wisdom of Pali and Prakrit to the lyrical songs in Braj and Maithili. Language in India is not learned, it is inherited. It is not just spoken, it is breathed.

With over 19,500 documented mother tongues, 122 major languages, and 22 recognised in the Constitution, India is not just a country, it is a confluence of civilisations. This diversity is not superficial, it is spiritual. It defines identities, connects generations, and carries the dreams of people who may never write their names but will chant lullabies, prayers, and stories in the language of their ancestors.

Yet, despite this proud abundance, a quiet conflict brews the tension between the emotional truth of multilingualism and the political convenience of monolingualism. In the name of governance, there has often been a tendency to simplify what India refuses to be: uniform.

Before Borders, There Were Languages:

During the freedom struggle, language was not viewed as a wedge but as a wellspring of unity. Gandhiji, ever attuned to the hearts of the people, insisted that real education must begin in the mother tongue as it is in one’s first language that thoughts blossom and self-worth takes root. Congress gatherings rang with diverse languages, not out of necessity, but as a symbol of inclusion and pride.

The Nehru Report of 1928, well ahead of its time, recognised the legitimacy of linguistic reorganisation long before it became a political demand. It was a time when leaders recognised that freedom must echo in one’s own voice. Political independence without linguistic freedom would have remained hollow.

Potti Sriramulu and the Language That Bled

The emotional depth of India’s language question found its most visceral expression in 1952, when Potti Sriramulu, a Gandhia and gentle soul who embraced death after a 56-day hunger strike, pleading for a state for Telugu speakers. His body lay lifeless, but his silence roared across Andhra.

Andhra didn’t just mourn a man, it mourned the silencing of a mother tongue. Children, old men, farmers, and poets wept not because a leader had died, but because a voice had been unheard too long. His martyrdom led to the creation of Andhra Pradesh in 1953 which is the first state formed on linguistic lines. His death was a scream the nation could no longer ignore. It marked the moment when India understood that to deny a language was to deny dignity, to choke an identity, to erase a culture.

Drawing Borders with Tongues, Not Rulers;

In response, the government formed the States Reorganisation Commission in 1953. Its recommendations, adopted in the 1956 Act, redrew India’s internal map which was not based on colonial boundaries or revenue circles, but on the mother tongues of the people.

It was a revolutionary act of trust. For a nation so recently freed, to hand people the power to reorganise states based on language was a radical commitment to democracy. Fourteen states and six union territories were born, not through division, but through cultural inclusion.

India declared then what few dared: that language was not a threat to unity rather it was a bridge to belonging.

The Constitution’s Linguistic Wisdom

The Constitution, crafted with extraordinary care, approached the language issue with poetic precision and political pragmatism. It recognised that India’s unity must be woven with diversity not sewn with uniformity.

Article 343 made Hindi in Devanagari the official language of the Union but not the national language. That distinction, that silence, was deliberate. Article 345 empowered states to adopt their own official languages, safeguarding regional voices. Article 351 encouraged the development of Hindi, but with a gentle reminder: that it must draw strength from all Indian languages.

The Eighth Schedule, which began with 14 languages, has grown to include 22, reflecting India’s evolving linguistic conscience. Yet, several languages like Bhojpuri, Tulu, Garhwali, Rajasthani still wait in the shadows, voiceless in officialdom, vibrant in people’s hearts.

Tamil Nadu and the Fire of Resistance

In the 1960s, when the Centre proposed phasing out English and making Hindi the sole official language, Tamil Nadu rose not in revolt, but in anguish. The protest was not against Hindi, it was against imposition.

Young students, some barely teenagers, immolated themselves. The flames they lit were not just political they were emotional. They cried for the right to exist in their own voice.

The Centre, jolted, amended the Official Languages Act in 1963, allowing English to remain an associate official language. The message was clear: language cannot be legislated, it must be lived. Any attempt to overwrite identity with policy would be met with resistance as primal as the right to breathe.

Education: The Quiet Battlefield of Tongues

In classrooms across India, millions of children sit in silent despair who are unable to understand the words on the blackboard, lost in translation before they can dream.

A tribal girl in Jharkhand, who speaks Ho at home, is expected to learn science in Hindi or English. A boy in Meghalaya, fluent in Khasi, struggles through textbooks written in foreign tongues. Exams, assignments, and assessments are often tilted in favour of dominant-language speakers.

These children do not lack potential but they lack access. Their failure is not in intelligence, but in the system’s indifference. In such spaces, language becomes a wall i.e, cold, hard, and unforgiving.

The Modi Government and the Revival of Linguistic Identity

In recent years, under Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the language issue has re-emerged, but this time with a deliberate national focus. The attempt is not merely to promote Hindi, but to rejuvenate Indian languages that have long stood in the shadow of English.

NCERT books are being translated into Hindi and regional languages to democratise knowledge. Competitive examinations like UPSC are being conducted in more Indian languages, signalling greater linguistic inclusion. Parliamentary and judicial proceedings are increasingly being encouraged to operate in Hindi. Government initiatives are digitising ancient scripts and regional texts, preserving not just language but legacy. Notably, professional courses in medicine and engineering are now being offered in regional languages which is an unprecedented step towards linguistic empowerment.

For many, these policies feel less like politics and more like justice. A girl in a Madhya Pradesh village, studying engineering in Hindi, feels valued. A farmer’s son writing the UPSC exam in Marathi or Bhojpuri feels dignified. These are not electoral optics they are lived revolutions.

Resistance from States: Assertion, Not Animosity

However, this linguistic resurgence has also met with resistance. Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, West Bengal, and parts of the Northeast have responded with protective measures to guard their languages. Tamil signage replaces Hindi on roads. Kannada becomes compulsory in schools. Bengal asserts Bengali in official communication.

But these acts are not defiance, they are declarations. These states are not rejecting India; they are reasserting their place within it. They are saying: “We, too, are India. In our script, in our sound, in our syntax.”

In a truly federal democracy, such conversations must not only be tolerated, they must be cherished. They are not threats to unity but its essential expression.

NEP 2020: A Whisper of Hope

The National Education Policy 2020 has offered a fresh, inclusive lens to language in education. It recommends instruction in the mother tongue till at least Class 5, preferably till Class 8, allowing cognitive development to flourish naturally. It embraces multilingualism, not as an imposition but as a possibility.

The NEP also envisions teaching STEM subjects in Indian languages, breaking the colonial legacy that has long tied intellect to English. For the first time in decades, students in rural Maharashtra or Odisha may learn biology in Marathi or Odia is not as second-class learners, but as rightful inheritors of knowledge.

A Future of Harmony, Not Homogenisation

India’s strength lies not in speaking one voice louder, but in letting all voices be heard. Unity cannot be built on uniformity. The future must embrace all tongues without hierarchy, without fear.

India must now invest in translation infrastructure, linguistic technology, and policy frameworks that empower every language from the globally spoken Bengali to the endangered Mishing or Bhili. Civil service exams must be held in more languages. State archives must digitise oral histories and scripts. Schools must allow children to think first in the language they dream in.

Let Hindi rise but not alone. Let it rise beside Kannada, Kashmiri, Santali, Dogri, Manipuri, and Urdu.

Let Every Tongue Be Sacred

Language is not mere vocabulary. It is prayer whispered at dawn, lullabies sung at dusk. It is the rhythm of a loom, the chant of a priest, the roar of a protest, and the whisper of love. It is who we are before we are named.

To elevate one language should never require the abandonment of another. If Hindi is to rise, let it rise alongside but not above. Let every tongue find space to sing, every script a place to live, every dialect a future that is not forgotten.

“Don’t ask me to choose just one word when my soul sings in many.”

India is not a monologue. It is a chorus. And in that chorus, every voice matters.