All India Radio clarifies that it is committed to conserve regional languages
Political parties and devoted listeners of the radio in Tamil Nadu have objected to All India Radio's internal circular, increasing the duration of the Hindi broadcast slot by four hours in its commercial broadcast service (CBS) aired through radio
Chennai: Political parties and devoted listeners of the radio in Tamil Nadu have objected to All India Radio’s internal circular, increasing the duration of the Hindi broadcast slot by four hours in its commercial broadcast service (CBS) aired through radio stations in Nagercoil, Dharmapuri and Karaikal as they claim it was an attempt to impose Hindi on people.
V. Chakravarthy, assistant director of programmes, CBS, Chennai, pointed out, however, that the public broadcaster had no plans to impose any language in an area where sufficient speakers of a non-mother tongue were not existent.
“AIR is committed to conserve, enrich and promote regional languages and cultural heritage, which it will continue to do without any misconceived intention,” he said.
But not everyone was convinced. Opposing AIR’s circular, DMK deputy general secretary Durai Murugan said that the Centre had several more pressing unresolved issues, such as attacks by Pakistan and China and the Lankan Tamil problem.
“The Narendra Modi-led BJP regime considers (popularising of) Hindi as its priority because only two subjects are of prime importance to it: Hindutva and Hindi. First, they thrust Hindi on the UPSC, then CBSE and now AIR. Tamil Nadu has been stoutly opposing this every time they made an attempt to push Hindi or Hindutva. It is time they stopped it or else Tamil Nadu will see another 1965-like anti-Hindi uprising,” said Durai Murugan.
BJP state president and Tamil language exponent Dr Tamilisai Soundararajan too reacted sharply to the move. “After I learnt about the circular, I wrote a letter to the Union information and broadcasting minister Prakash Javadekar urging him to accord importance to regional languages. We had insisted that the Tamil language should be used to air programmes for four hours, instead of Hindi, as this would help reach people in a large way,” she said.
Politicians apart, keen listeners of the radio have sought immediate withdrawal of the AIR circular. K. Palani, who has been tuning into AIR and other stations across the world for the past three decades, pointed out that the objection was not to AIR broadcasting Hindi music, but other content in Hindi. “People in remote villages in Tamil Nadu still tune in to AIR for entertainment and news, if they air content in Hindi they will not be able to understand,” he said.
( Source : dc correspondent )
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