‘Hindi not a national language if whole country is not speaking it’: Adoor Gopalakrishnan

Mumbai: Adoor Gopalakrishnan, the National award winning filmmaker, proclaims that Hindi should not be treated as a national language if the whole country is not speaking it just like in South and Northeast India.

Gopalakrishnan feels Hindi is a beautiful language; however it should not be imposed and be counted as a regional language since India is a country with diverse cultures.

"Hindi is a very beautiful language. There are very fine writers in Hindi, no doubt about that, but you cannot impose Hindi over and above others.. not only administratively but even otherwise," he told reporters.

Regarded as one of the finest filmmakers of the country, Gopalakrishnan, 74, is considered to be one of those who revolutionized the Malayalam cinema.

Since India is made up of various cultures, Adoor senses that an "exclusive" attitude will not work.

"Hindi was by official imposition only. Because officially they want to have one language kind of attitude from everybody… that's a very exclusive kind of attitude. India is a country of several different cultures, languages, styles of living.

"Naturally, you have to allow and understand that. It's all together only that India is made up of," he said, on the sidelines of the second edition of Gateway LitFest here.

With his debut film "Swayamvaram" in 1972, the filmmaker proved to be a pioneer in the new wave cinema movement in Kerala. His last film "Oru Pennum Randaanum" (A Climate of Crime) in 2008 won him the Kerala state award for best director.

Adoor says a language cannot become 'national' if only a part of the country speaks it.

"It is wrong when you think Hindi is a national language and other languages are regional. All the languages are regional, it becomes national only when everybody in the country speaks a particular language, but that doesn't happen," he said.

Adoor feels Hindi is not more than a medium for inter-community dialogues.

"In the North-East, in South, they don't speak Hindi. So, you cannot call it national language. These are languages used for inter-community dialogues, not more than that. Hindi is reaching more people because most of the North is speaking Hindi. It should be treated as regional language only," he said. (Inputs from Agencies, Image source: iffcolombo.com)