The comments by the home minister Amit shah on English speaking Indians is problematic and laden with ideological bias. While it is true that Indian languages are our greatest cultural assets and protector of civilization, languages are meant to include and not exclude. Languages serve two primary functions, one is conveying one’s thoughts to the world and the other is to inform those thoughts as the repository of knowledge. While there is no question over the superiority of native languages in expressing one’s thoughts, the function of informing and knowledge building is nuanced. English has opened us to the world and its progress. It has been the vehicle of modernity and collective resistance against historical social oppression. For all its trumpeting of Hindi promotion, there has been no visible effort to create a modern knowledge base in Hindi. The “pathya pustak Nigam” established in states by previous governments to publish textbooks in Hindi for universities hasn’t lived upto their promise and the current regime hasn’t acted on it at all. Most countries like Russia and Japan carrying out higher education and cutting edge research in native languages, have huge translation bodies to keep abreast with latest developments worldwide. It is true that acquiring English is not free like native languages and therefore increases the already high gap between the social classes. While this is definitely a failure of the system, English is not to be blamed for it. Even Sanskrit and Persian as privileged languages built enormous barriers against social mobility. Saying that they would soon make a society where English speakers would feel ashamed, hints at many aspects. One that they would take their anti-intellectual propaganda further. We have already seen attacks on most centers of excellence. The populism of anti- intellectualism colored as anti elitism is politically formidable. Secondly it is against non Hindi speakers using English as a link language and trying to impose Hindi. This is challenged as being unfairly favorable to the Hindi speakers. English is a major resistance tool in the ambedkarite culture as all native languages are built around caste and feudal hegemonies. The majoritarian threat that this statement conveys is nothing but a dog whistle to their cadre of unemployed youth, frustrated by the lack of opportunity in the economy and envious of the opportunities that accrue to the English educated in a globalized economy.
A majoritarian dog whistle
