"Hindi Imperialism": Opposition Slams Amit Shah's National Language Pitch
NDTV
Amit Shah had earlier said Prime Minister Narendra Modi has decided that the medium of running the government is the official language and this will definitely increase the importance of Hindi.
Home Minister Amit Shah's pitch for the Hindi language provoked trenchant criticism on Friday, with opposition parties calling it an assault on India's pluralism and asserting they will thwart the move to impose "Hindi imperialism".
The main opposition Congress accused Shah of trying to impose Hindi, and said in doing so he is doing a disservice to the language.
Congress leader Jairam Ramesh contended Hindi is 'Raj Bhasha' (official language) and not 'Rashtra Bhasha' (national language), as Rajnath Singh had noted in Parliament when he was the home minister.
"Hindi imperialism will be the death knell for India. I'm very comfortable with Hindi, but I don't want it rammed down anybody's throat. Amit Shah is doing a disservice to Hindi by imposing it," Ramesh said on Twitter.
