Whenever I hear the slogan One Nation One Language, first question that pops up in my head is what is the problem statement? What are we missing now that will get addressed by moving to one language nationwide? This fascination with one language, one national language, is not new, it has been there from pre-independence days. Let’s consider some facts. As per 2001 & 2011 census, India has 122 major languages and 1500+ other languages. These could be more since many of them are categorized under unclassified. Even considering 122 major languages, only 22 are recognized by eighth schedule of our constitution. Rather than wondering and asking why other languages are not recognized and given official status yet, there is a clamor towards one language for the nation. Reasoning given is having one language across the nation will unify the population, improve unity. Is there unity missing among the population currently? How do you measure unity? What is the metric for unity? Is participating in election nationwide in a democratic way with no bloodshed isn’t measure of unity?

Why is this fascination with One. The One in One Language for the nation  refers to numeral one and not oneness. Out of multiple languages, we want to move to one. Similar to one election, one ration card, one ID card, etc. Out of multiple choices, choose one, the one dictated by those in power and majority. Multiple causes confusion, in their world view. So, it is not about unity, but uniformity.  Straitjacket the population. It can’t be unity, because, if language does unite people, then we can merge UK and USA, where most of the population speak English. On the other hand, Bangalore, where I live, is as united as any other metropolitan in the world, even with so much diversity in the population, languages, culture, religion, etc. As diversified as it can get, but still united with idea of Bangalore keeping the population together, similar to Chennai, Mumbai or any other metro.

By moving to One, are they trying to achieve equality since language identity becomes one? By definition idea of equality means respecting and treating people equal while acknowledging their differences, gender, race, color, language, etc. When we say men and women are equal, it doesn’t  mean they need to look the same. They need to be considered equal, irrespective of their physical differences.  

So, it is not unity or equality but uniformity the proponents of One Language are looking for. To be fair, every government at the center, not just the current one, and various state governments, have fancied with this idea of enforcing one. The operative word here is enforcing, force an idea on the population. It is not that all people who speak Tamil or Hindi or Kannada are united. Within those populations, there are still other identities which slice them further, religion, caste, gender, class, sexual orientation, etc. Unlike Korea or China, we are large number of small populations. Forcing any identity or uniformity on this population is bound to break the existing unity.

To those who still want to pursue One Nation One Language idea, I have some more ideas they can chase to bring more uniformity among the population.

Families breakup, unity is broken, fighting for who controls the remote at home. Why because we have too many channels. Did this happen in good old days of Doordarshan? No way. Whole TN switched of the TV at 8:40pm when the broadcast switched to New Delhi. Family First. Let’s move to one channel. One Nation One Channel. Don’t tell me you don’t know which channel that is going to be.

We have innumerable fruits. Very confusing. More troublesome for children who need to mug up all the names, and color the pictures. Simplify to one fruit, Banana. Even within banana, there are too many varieties. Should simplify that too. Let’s pick Matti Pazham. Announce Matti Pazham as national fruit too. One Nation One Banana.

You get the idea. You can easily extend it to products and brands with simple equation, <choose your product> <choose your brand> <choose color>. There is so much uniformity possible. No unhealthy competition, brings in calmness, and population will be in a meditative state.

Final one, anyone who can make it happen, no erase that, let them just campaign with that slogan, my vote is for them in next election. This is the real problem that plagues our nation from being One, not the numeral one, but Oneness. One Nation One Caste. This will be better since one caste means no caste. We will truly become a Casteless Society. Let’s start with shedding our caste surnames. Anyone out there? Hello?