Hacker News Reader

Comment by akssri | Hacker News Reader

I agree with the sentiment - however, even after independence, India has been ruled by the same Anglophone/phile elite with nearly the same set of laws/policies/ interests. Even the Indian constitution comes in large part from the 1935 GoI Act passed in the British Parliament.

(Anglo-)India is of the Anglophones, by the Anglophones and for the Anglophones for all practical purposes.

That's why laws etc. are mandated to be written in this foreign language that's incomprehensible to the majority, and why there's a strict near-apartheid like barrier preventing higher education (and with it, higher employment) to non-Anglophones.

The only reason I imagine we don't hear about this systematic discrimination that prevent downstream material development like industrialization (as opposed to the ethereal one like caste) is perhaps because Western institutions have vested geopolitical interest in having such a large vassal, intellectually if not politically.

View on HN

> mandated to be written in this foreign language that'

I am sure people from the Northern belt would be happy if the laws were written in Tamil (my mother tongue).

EU laws get written in 24 languages - and the CJEU (the equivalent of SC) doesn't give precedence to any one "master" language. These arguments for a "master-language" (let alone a foreign one), by both Hindi/Tamil nationalists, are cliched and threadbare.

In my opinion, these are just excuses for continued colonial-era English-imposition - because it's often only the aforementioned section that makes such brain-dead arguments.

For all the politically-ostentatious love of their own mother-languages there's not a single technical-university of any great reputation in either of these (it's worse in other Indic languages). The economic-value of these languages is close to zero if not negative.

Sheldon Pollock notes that, even in classical studies and literature, the institutions have turned utterly incompetent and filled with political retainers who can barely hold a mantle to people from previous generations who were experts in linguistics and manuscriptology.

So much for "Hindi/Tamil..." pride...

> colonial-era English-imposition

Making it 45 languages etc will not solve issues. The point is not master or slave. Stop that victim mindset.

If people follow law and order all will be fine. Telling reputation etc is all good. Foreign people study and celebrate Indic languages better. Foreign institutes spend more grants in that.

> there's not a single technical-university of any great reputation in either of these (it's wor

It was tried in S.India - Anna University. Very few people joined to do B E in Computer Science Engg.

The real question is every ruler wants to keep population stupid.

You still celebrate people like NarayanaMoorthy or L& T chairman. biju or ola CEOs lying in public.

At the end, there is endemic corruption. Blaming UK or West will not solve anything.

Comments like these do injustice with Indian constitution which grants:

1. Protection of Language and Script (Article 29)

Article 29(1): "Any section of the citizens... having a distinct language, script or culture of its own shall have the right to conserve the same.

Article 29(2): "No citizen shall be denied admission into any educational institution maintained by the State or receiving aid out of State funds on grounds only of religion, race, caste, language or any of them."

Article 30(1): "All minorities, whether based on religion or language, shall have the right to establish and administer educational institutions of their choice."

Article 350: "Every person shall be entitled to submit a representation for the redress of any grievance to any officer or authority... in any of the languages used in the Union or in the State..."

Article 350. Language to be used in representations for redress of grievances- Every person shall be entitled to submit a representation for the redress of any grievance to any officer or authority of the Union or a State in any of the languages used in the Union or in the State, as the case may be.

Article 350A. Facilities for instruction in mother-tongue at the primary stage - It shall be the endeavor of every State and of every local authority within the State to provide adequate facilities for instruction in the mother-tongue at the primary stage of education to children belonging to linguistic minority groups; and the President may issue such directions to any State as he considers necessary or proper for securing the provision of such facilities.

Article 350B. Special Officer for linguistic minorities-

    There shall be a Special Officer for linguistic minorities to be appointed by the President.
    It shall be the duty of the Special officer to investigate all matters relating to the safeguards provided for linguistic minorities under this Constitution and report to the President upon those matters at such intervals as the President may direct, and the president shall cause all such reports to be laid before each House of Parliament and sent to the Government of the States concerned.

The only unequal part which is only applicable to Hindi and not other languages:

Article 351. Directive for development of the Hindi language- It shall be the duty of the Union to promote the spread of the Hindi language, to develop it so that it may serve as a medium of expression for all the elements of the composite culture of India and to secure its enrichment by assimilating without interfering with its genius, the forms, style and expressions used in Hindustani and in the other languages of India specified in the Eighth Schedule, and by drawing, wherever necessary or desirable, for its vocabulary, primarily on Sanskrit and secondarily on other languages.

  Amendment Act  Year  Languages Added  Resulting Total
  Original Constitution  1950  14 Original Languages      14 languages
  21st Amendment Act     1967  Sindhi                     15 languages
  71st Amendment Act     1992  Konkani, Manipuri, Nepali  18 languages
  92nd Amendment Act     2003  Bodo, Dogri, Maithili, Santhali  22 languages
  96th Amendment Act     2011  "Oriya" to "Odia"          22 languages

Doubt in Germany a user can submit documents in French and can get have special protection by Germany for promoting French language.

TL;DR Tamil Nadu should ... be its own country?

It doesn't sound like a particularly large leap to think that polities as large as the Indian federal states could work as countries.

> Doubt in Germany a user can submit documents in French and can get have special protection by Germany for promoting French language.

I did submit a non-German language document to get my German citizenship.

At the end, whatever you say - India is f*ked up by regional politics. With English a poor person from region A can go to B and find some job/livelihood.

Are you against it? I understand you want homogeneity - it is not there.

But people like you creating divisions by telling

>>>> It shall be the duty of the Union to promote the spread of the Hindi language, to

will promote more chaos. Good for rest of the rich world especially west and China.

Like my physics teacher used to say in Chennai... We don't need foreigners to mess us - We Indians do it for us.

All you want is India to fight like Arab states - internally. Divide and conquer. Thank you from the West and China.

These laws mean zilch - the state of Karnataka, which hosts Bengaluru, where demagogues routinely raise Xenophobia based on language, has exactly 1-school that teaches Science/Mathematics at the high-school level (PUC, 11/12th) in Kannada.

Try using these "laws" and "rights" when you're trying to apply for a university, or asking a IIT to teach you in Hindi/Tamil LOL. These provisions are mostly used to skirt around the (generally onerous) laws by so-called "minority institutions" (eg. Manipal).

It's very disingenous to make such arguments by anyone with their eyes open in India. It's almost like the classic quip (almost a criticism of proto-liberalism) about the British empire: everyone is free in it as long as he's British!

Indians will go to Germany and learn German; go to Japan and learn Japanese; but will resist building anything of value with the culture/language of their own states of residence. The Anglophone-Indians will religiously preach a particularly seductive form of nationalist-liberalism internally for India that continues all the colonial structures of the British empire, because it helps them optimize for their own economic outcomes (ofc. they do this internationally too).

Absurd state of affairs tbh - and it has (eg. Blume Ventures' report) and will keep India poor with the wealth limited to ~5-10% of the population.

Last I checked, the Union Govt is not going around imposing English everywhere like they are pushing Hindi.

Also India's wealth is always going to be limited to 5-10℅ of the citizenry. India is pretty much USA on steroids at this point - a handful of capitalists controlling a lot of public infrastructure, ministers openly indulging in corruption, routine exploitation of the working class, piss poor healthcare and education provision where they try to skirt around the evolution question and Gandhism. The bowing down of India to the US is no surprise, given all of these other factors already playing around in the background.

> Indians will go to Germany and learn German; go to Japan and learn Japanese; but will resist building anything of value with the culture/language of their own states of residence. The A

I wish they do. If you read Facebook group Indians in Frankfurt - you will the entitled Indians - especially those coming for IT jobs - in deputation for Infosys etc (that speak in many ways not the best english) trying to talk in English with all bureacrats or even 85 year old - and expect - every damn plumbber or cleaner to speak English - as if they have scored 99.% in TOEFL or so.

They constantly say: See in India everyone speaks English. why can't you all speak English? When I point out if your go to Coimbatore and speak English in Tahsildar office or RTO - you will get f*ked.

I know the feeling because - I am from South - grew up in North. average person has so much hatred. Until you fix that you cant do anything.

> but will resist building anything of value with the culture/language of their own states of residence. Th

You have some horrible feeling for UK. Forget that. Go and tell Narayanamoothy or Modi to give jobs in software (and every other whitecollar) exclusively to people that have linguistic ability.

Blaming others is the escapism that you Indians are happy for.

> You have some horrible feeling for UK. Forget that.

You have a serious issue with general comprehension, sir.

I've not once brought up UK or Western countries - my issue was/is/will-be with the Anglophone-Indian elites (who think they're honorary part of UK now ?), who will paint themselves as saints to the world with M.K Gandhi's face, but who are vicious corpulent vessels of the most vile forms of racism from the worst periods of the British-empire of 1 1/2 century before. India has more British laws inherited from this period, while UK itself has completely transformed itself (including the Civil-Service).

I'll not reply to the rest of the screed - that well-studied pedagogical gap of having to spend inordinate amount of time "muggin-up" things in English instead of actually understanding things means that I can't get much across anyway...

It’s written in English because it’s the language spoken by the educated.

My wife is from south India, and I’m a frequent visitor to India.

It’s evident that Hindi nationalism is to the benefit of the north, while southern culture is slowly being replaced.

Hong Kong also uses English.

I assume it does have advantages. The common law of the ex British colonies are all broadly compatible, so there's the possibility of having judges from other countries decide cases. Trade and maritime law is/ was basically British law. I would guess it also helps foreign investment if the law is in a language those investors understand.

Yes, these were probably better reasons in the past though.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com