There has been a lot of agitation from the southern states of India over the past few years against the alleged imposition of the Hindi language, considered to be a largely northern language.
As a sign of protest, members of the Karnataka Rakshana Vedike (KaRaVe), on Friday, September 14, blackened the Hindi signboards along various national highways in the state on Friday, September 14. The Centre celebrated Hindi Diwas (Hindi day) on September 14, to mark the day on which Hindi became an official language of the Union Government under Article 343 of the Constitution back in 1949.
KaRaVe President T A Narayana Gowda claimed that the Centre was propagating its hidden agenda of imposing Hindi on the population, a large majority of whom are non-Hindi speaking and that this was their way of resisting this policy.
Milestones on NH 48 near Davangere and signs along on the various highways in Bengaluru, Mysuru, Kolar, Shivamogga and some other districts were blackened by the KaRaVe activists.
A similar form of protest was carried out by the KaRaVe back in 2017 when they barged into the metro stations in Bengaluru and blackened the Hindi signboards while shouting slogans against the imposition of the Hindi language.
KaRaVe activists, in a bid to seek equality among all the languages in the country, are trying to get other non-Hindi speaking states to join in their efforts to oppose the BJP-ruled Centre’s imposition of the Hindi language on them.
Narayana said that it is disrespectful to other languages and unacceptable to make Hindi the official language of the union government, as India is a multilingual country. He also condemned the fact that the Centre wants to celebrate only Hindi Diwas.
PTI
