Communication in Asia and its Influence

Even after fifty years as an independent country, there is no real national language, despite government attempts to promote Hindi, which is spoken in the northern part of the country. Linguistically related to Sanskrit, Hindi is the single most spoken language in India, but even so it falls well short of a majority. In 1971 there were 153,792,062 Hindi speakers listed, but even though it is widely spoken (and linguistically related to other languages in the so-called Hindi Belt of north India), there was significant resistance to a government proposal to make it the national language.

The main opposition came from speakers of the Dravidian languages of the south and tribal groups, who felt that they would be disadvantaged if Hindi became the language of government examinations, higher education, and interstate communication. People in the north who speak either Hindi or a linguistically related language would have a significant edge, while speakers of other languages would have to become proficient in Hindi to compete. In response to these concerns, the Indian government first mandated that both English and Hindi would be national languages until 1965, after which English would be dropped, but continued pressure forced the government to retain English for an indefinite period until it could be replaced by Hindi. Many Indian nationalists deplore this situation and feel that the continued use of the language of India's colonizers is an affront to national dignity, but the situation seems likely to continue for the foreseeable future.

A complex system of center-state communication has been devised. Most of India's states are organized along linguistic lines, and those states in which Hindi is dominant must communicate with the central government in Hindi. Others may communicate in either Hindi or English. In India, language is closely linked to cultural identity, and there are concerted efforts in many parts of India to ensure that traditional tongues are maintained.