DNA Special: Why is talking in one's mother tongue a matter of shame?

Today, we want to tell you about a piece of news from Canada, which will fill you with pride. This is the first time that an Indian-origin MP has delivered a speech in the Canadian Parliament in his mother tongue, Kannada. The name of this MP is Chandra Arya and he is the leader of the Liberal Party of Canada. Earlier, leaders of Indian origin used to give speeches in the English language in the Parliament there but this MP changed this tradition.

You might remember that in the year 2020, an Indian-origin MP Gaurav Sharma in New Zealand also took an oath in the Sanskrit language. Gaurav Sharma hails from the Hamirpur district of Himachal Pradesh and he is one of the youngest MPs of New Zealand. 

Now, the big question is that when people of Indian origin abroad are giving due respect to their mother tongue, then what is happening in our country. Today, many people in our country consider their mother tongue to be only one language. In our country, children remember English poems but they do not remember the stories and poems in their mother tongue.

Nowadays, it has become a trend to listen to English songs by wearing headphones while traveling. Speaking, reading, and writing English is a status symbol. We like to greet with the English word 'Hello' more than Hindi's 'Namaste'. These things are also spoken of in our society that if you learn English, you will get a job and gain respect. That is, if there is a world war of languages ​​today, then India's languages ​​like Hindi, Marathi, Gujarati, Bengali, Punjabi, and Oriya will be defeated without a fight.

For example, all the filmmakers, directors, actors, and actresses in Bollywood today prefer to speak in English rather than in their mother tongue. Actors working in Hindi language films consider it a matter of embarrassment to talk in Hindi during shooting. Everyone, from big directors to producers, want to earn money by making films in the Hindi language but they consider it out of fashion to talk to each other in Hindi and give more priority to the English language.

However, this is not the case in South Indian films. Artists from South India consider their mother tongue to be a matter of pride. They do not believe that if they make a film in their mother tongue or speak in their mother tongue, their status will be reduced or they will be considered illiterate.

Mother tongue means the first language that a child learns after birth. The Mother tongue combines three things - cultural values, history, and traditions i.e. mother tongue germinates three ideas in us. 

However, the condition of the provincial languages, which are also called mother tongues in India, is not very good and people prefer English over their mother tongue. 

Many people in our country do not understand the seriousness of this matter. At present, the International Film Festival is being organized in Cannes city of France, in which many actors and actresses from India have also reached. One of them being Deepika Padukone. When Deepika Padukone reached India's pavilion at this festival, she was unable to even speak the Hindi language properly. 

Deepika Padukone has gone to this festival from India's side but surprisingly, she has not tweeted about India's presence at this festival so far. She made her last tweet on February 25, 2021, in which she was promoting the bags of Louis Vuitton, a famous French company.

This shows that the celebrities and artists whom we consider to be our role models, they tweet for money. However, when they go to lead India in such an international festival, they do not even talk about our country. 

These people tweet more for their clients than for their country.

You must remember that previously cricketers also used to show this inferiority complex towards their mother tongue. Earlier, our cricketers who used to go abroad to play were hesitant to speak there in their mother tongue. Even today, most sportspersons prefer to speak in English rather than Hindi or their other mother tongue.

There have been many efforts to change this attitude towards the mother tongue. Former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee was the first person from India who addressed the General Assembly of the United Nations in the year 1977 in the Hindi language. That is, for this moment, the Hindi language had to wait 30 years after independence. Atal Bihari Vajpayee was the Foreign Minister of India at that time. 

Apart from this, the current Prime Minister of India, Narendra Modi has also given a speech in Hindi at the United Nations.