In a major embarrassment for India, president of rightwing Hindu party BJP has said English language is bad for India as it has caused great loss to country and eroded cultural values.
New Delhi, July 20/Nationalturk – The president of Indian rightwing Hindu party Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Rajnath Singh has caused a political storm by his controversial remarks that English language is bad for India as it has caused great loss to country and eroded cultural values.
“The English language has caused a great loss to the country. We are losing our language, our culture as there are hardly any people who speak Sanskrit now,” said Singh, who is BJP president.
He said people in India have started to forget their religion and culture these days. “There are only 14,000 people left in this country speaking in Sanskrit. Knowledge acquired out of English is not harmful but the Anglicization penetrated into the youth is dangerous.”
Singh had further said that people in India have lost everything in the era of modernism. “English language has caused maximum damage to India. Knowing or speaking English is not bad but the problem is when we try to act like an Englishman”.
Comments draw strong criticism from political leaders
The Hindu leader’s comments have drawn strong criticism from major political leaders of India.
Senior leader of Indian Congress and Indian Minister of State for Human Resources Development Shashi Tharoor said English language is an asset. “The fact is that English has been a great advantage for us during our economic expansion in the last 20 years. The fact that we have knowledgeable, educated, English speaking young people, has been a huge asset enhancing the economic growth, trade, outsourcing”.
Another Congress leader and Indian Minister for Information and Broadcasting Manish Tewari said BJP had itself “outsourced” its vision document to people who only spoke English. “I sometimes feel like laughing at our friends. On one side their vision document is outsourced to people who don’t speak any language other than English. Is this medievalism or hypocrisy,”
He said this attempt to create a dispute over language or saying that one language is better or worse that another, doesn’t strengthen the country and is not expected from a responsible political party.”
‘It reflects BJP’s preoccupation with Hindu revivalism’
Senior leader of Communist party Sitaram Yechury said the statement reflects BJP chief’s preoccupation with Hindu revivalism. “Just by learning a language, people don’t lose cultural roots or foundations. For most Indians, English is an additional language, and it does not insulate or separate people from their identities”.
He said knowing English will only help Indians to advance and develop further.
Another Indian leader said rightwing BJP was opposed to English language as it is at odds with modernity itself. “All things Indian by tradition, be it caste, be it social structure, political structure, have stopped India from growing into a modern society. If English is eliminating tradition, it is also eliminating a culture that is caste-driven”.
“It (BJP) is opposing English because of its opposition to modernity itself,” he added.
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Faiz Ahmad / NationalTurk India News
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