Hindi Diwas 2023: The 14th of September is National ‘Hindi Diwas’ in India. The Hindi language was adopted as one of the official languages of the Republic of India on this day in 1949. On September 14, 1949, the Indian Constitution, written in Devanagari script, recognized Hindi as the official language of India. On September 14, 1953, India observed the first Hindi day (Hindi Diwas). Around 425 million people speak Hindi as their primary language, and 120 million speak it as a second language.
Uttar Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Haryana, Bihar, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Maharashtra, Chhattisgarh, and Punjab are among the states where Hindi is widely spoken. Hindi is also spoken in Mauritius, Nepal, Fuji, Suriname, Guyana, and Trinidad & Tobago.
Why Hindi Diwas is celebrated
One key reason for commemorating Hindi Diwas is to counteract the country’s growing reliance on English. Mahatma Gandhi referred to Hindi as the people’s language. On the occasion of Hindi Diwas, many literary and cultural activities are held throughout India. Furthermore, during Hindi Diwas, prizes like as the Rajbasha Kirti Puraskar and the Rajbhasha Gaurav Puraskar are granted to ministries, departments, public sector units, and public sector banks for their contributions to the promotion of Hindi.
This is also the birthday of the Indian writer Simha, who battled valiantly to establish Hindi as an official language.
Other languages in India
The Indian constitution recognizes 22 main Indian languages in what is known as “the 8th Schedule” of the Constitution. Assamese, Bangla, Bodo, Dogri, Gujarati, Hindi, Marathi, Kashmiri, Kannada, Konkani, Maithili, Malayalam, Manipuri, Nepali, Oriya, Punjabi, Tamil, Telugu, Santali, Sindhi, and Urdu are among them.
Read More: Apple Announces iOS 17 update, release date comes in the shadow of the iPhone ‘Wonderlust’ event
Originally, just 14 languages were listed in the Indian constitution’s 8th Schedule. Later, the languages of Konkani, Bodo, Dogri, Maithili, Manipuri, Nepali, Santali, and Sindhi were recognized.
