The G20 summit gave a strong push to make Hindi an international language. It may welcome an official language of UN soon
With India’s constant rise in the international system with the G20 summit being a huge success and being widely hailed internationally, Hindi- the most spoken language in India, is also fast acquiring an international status, and the days don’t appear far when it may be recognized as the United Nation’s official language too. India’s mission of globalising Hindi is amply reflected by External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar when he said that India is trying to globalise Hindi by seeking its recognition as the United Nation’s official language and there has been some progress and the process may take some time to complete.
The exercise around globalising Hindi is not new. Considering its fast-growing potential owing to its demographic trends and a rapidly expanding economy and military, India started the World Hindi Conference long ago. According to Forbes India, Hindi is the third most spoken language in the world with 60 crore speakers. Only English with 1,13.2 crore and Mandarin with 1,11.7 crore speakers are ahead of Hindi.
In 2019, the number of Hindi speakers was estimated at 615 million. The 22nd edition of the world language database Ethnologue stated English at the top of the list with 1,132 million speakers and Chinese Mandarin at the second position with 1,117 million speakers. Bangla has been ranked as the 7th most spoken language of the world with 228 million native speakers.
Ethnologue brings out a yearly database of living languages of the world since its establishment in 1951. The current round of the database covers 7,111 living languages of the world. And Hindi becoming the third most spoken language of the world, is not a small achievement. Hindi is already being used by UNESCO in its social media and newsletters.
Presently, the UN has six official languages- Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Russian and Spanish. Now, when Hindi is the third most spoken language, there is no point in it not being included in the UN list of official languages. As per the UN laws, a delegate may speak in any official UN language and then the speech is interpreted simultaneously into the other official languages. Now it is widely considered that a few other widely spoken languages should also be included in the list of official languages as multilingualism enables effective communication between the UN's linguistically and culturally diverse member states. Multilingualism also ensures increased and enthused participation of the member states in the organisation’s work, besides ensuring greater effectiveness, better outcomes and more involvement. Constituting the core value of the UN, multilingualism also eliminates the hegemony of English and ensures full and equitable treatment and respect for other languages. Now we hope that the ‘Hindi@UN’ project, launched in 2018 by the Modi government to enhance the public outreach of the UN in the Hindi language and to spread increased awareness about the issues of global importance among Hindi-speaking populations, will soon be a reality.
Mahatma Gandhi once called Hindi the language of the masses as it ties the nation in a thread of unity and has a special place in the public consciousness. Hindi was focused upon as a unifying force even during the freedom struggle to hasten India’s journey to independence. September 14 is celebrated as Hindi Diwas every year to further strengthen and spread this public consciousness across the country. The Constituent Assembly which framed the Indian constitution, accepted Hindi as the official language of the country on September 14, 1949. Without a doubt, Hindi Diwas ignites passion and love for the language among people. Along with various government departments schools, colleges and several private organisations organise literary and cultural events on this occasion across the country.
(The writer is a senior journalist; views are personal)
