The bane of India - its educated elite. We, carrying the white mans burden of feeling superior to the natives. Yogendra Yadav - The language question lies at the heart of the current controversy about the civil services examination of the UPSC. Much of the debate in the English media distracts our attention away from this core issue. The agitators themselves are much clearer, though they could have posed this issue more sharply. Some years ago, a renowned Indian academic stunned me during a casual dinner conversation. I was talking to her about my writings in Hindi as well as English. Writing in Hindi was important for pedagogic reasons, she agreed. But she was shocked when I insisted that I write some of my articles originally in Hindi. “Languages like Hindi and Tamil are good for street conversation. But surely you cannot do conceptual thinking in these languages, the way you can in English and French,” she said. That conversation has stayed with me, for it revealed in a flash something we all take for granted. She had said what our elites believe but do not say openly. Indian languages are believed to be inferior languages and those who express themselves principally in an Indian language are assumed to be inferior beings. - Yogendra Yadav Read: goo.gl/fZWFnY
Posted on: Mon, 04 Aug 2014 13:00:32 +0000
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