Proliferation of the English language in India since independence.
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Nehru took trouble to attain sufficient proficiency in Hindi so as to be able to communicate with large numbers of his people; but it was primarily in English that his thoughts were formulated and expressed. Widely read in English literature, he wrote with tense elegance and control of phrase, was capable on special occasions of superb flights of English prose, and hailed the coming of India's freedom with a passage that has moved into anthologies of English writing. Yet Nehru awaited with equanimity what he believed would be the quick and natural decline of the English language in a free India. Apart from the small AngloIndian minority whose mother-tongue it was, to all other Indians English was a foreign language which had spread only because the British had made it the medium of instruction. Like Latin in medieval Europe, and Sanskrit and Persian in pre-British India, English had been learnt by a small number in various parts of the country. A new, linguistic caste had evolved, isolated from the millions of ordinary men and women.
After 1947 Nehru and his colleagues rid themselves of any prejudices born of the feeling that English was the language that had helped the British to hold the Empire together. The first generation of independent India's leadership had no such complexes and were of the view that a language belongs to all those who speak it. As language communicates experience, it can transcend the boundaries of the culture of its origin. When, in 1945, an old Irish revolutionary started a letter lo Nehru in Gaelic and then switched to English with the remark, 'Forgive me for using the language of the enemy', Nehru's reaction was one of mild and amused surprise. To him, language was a part of the history of the people, each word calling up images, and yet alive and expanding to take new circumstances into account. If a language, while basing itself on its ancient roots and associations, was also receptive to growing needs, it would be strong and vigorous and be an index of the national character. As the whole background of the English language was different and its history unknown to the Indian people, Nehru did not think that it could ever become a living language widely spoken in India. For the educational and cultural development of the masses only the regional languages were suited.
Among them the one with the widest range, covering, with its variations, a large part of northern India, was Hindi, and Nehru felt that it should be promoted as the language linking up the whole country. Basic Hindi, with about five thousand words, and borrowing from Urdu, English and other languages, should be developed and could be picked up easily by most Indians, for the Indian languages are allied to each other. So Nehru was for gradually abandoning the use of English as an official language. He also expected and even desired it to fade out as the link language in India. He felt that there would be a psychological value in this, for, though not worried about its past ties with imperialism, it had hurt him, in his tours as Prime Minister to other parts of the world than Britain and the English-speaking countries, to note the surprise and contempt with which the use of English by Indians in conversing with each other was received. It was regarded as a sign of mental degradation. But Nehru conceded that it would be foolish to drop English altogether. It had already gained ground in India, was becoming an important world language and was indispensable for the advance of science and technology to which Nehru attached such importance in building a modern and forward-looking India. So Nehru wished English to be studied as a second language and for most people as a language of comprehension rather than as a language leading on to the study of English literature. Even from the thirties Nehru had been an exponent of Basic English.
But English stands its ground
In accord with this reasoning, Nehru supported the provision in the Constitution that Hindi would be the official language of the Union but English could also be used as the official language for the next fifteen years, that is, until 1965. He, like most others, thought that during that period Hindi would gain general acceptance as well as strength and suppleness to serve as the common language of India. But the expected did not happen. Hindi perforce made some headway. In the armed services, for example, where even in British days, a pidgin Hindi had been in vogue, the words of command were now converted to Hindi, as only the officers understood English. But in most areas of public activity the English language stood its ground. In fact, the enthusiasts for Hindi, finding fifteen years far too long and seeking to displace English.