On September 14, 1949, the Constituent Assembly of India adopted Hindi as the official language of the newly formed nation. The Indo-Aryan language had been in use across large sections of India in multiple forms by then and had in fact been carried outside the shores of the country by those who settled in other parts of the world through centuries. The migration of Hindi, in particular, the variant used in parts of Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan, is intimately tied up with the history of India itself.
Its presence and popularity in large parts of the world today is reflective of India’s colonial history and the movement of people that colonialism gave rise to. As we celebrate Hindi Diwas, here is a look at five other parts of the world where Hindi has an official status or is immensely popular.
Fiji
The island country in the South Pacific ocean is the only other country, apart from India, where Hindi is designated as an official language. The migration of the language to Fiji can be traced back to the late nineteenth century, when it became a British colony and when the colonial authorities needed imported labour in order to sustain the sugarcane industry there. Majority of those who formed the indentured labour force belonged to the linguistic region of northern India that is referred to as the Hindi belt, that today consists of states like Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan among others. There were labourers from other parts of India as well.
Over time, a distinct variety of Hindi developed in the island, that was more a product of the need for the labourers belonging to different parts of India to communicate with each other. The Fiji Hindi is a combination of elements from Hindustani and those from the native language there. Eventually, even the indigenous population of Fiji picked up Hindi. Today, about 37 per cent of Fiji’s population consists of Indians, a large majority of whom are the descendants of indentured labourers. The popularity of the language was recognised by the government after its independence in 1970 and Fiji Hindi continues to be recognised as an official language in the country.
Mauritius
The island nation on the Indian Ocean passed on as a colony from the Dutch to the French to the British over the course of three centuries. Indian presence in Mauritius can be traced back to the time when it was a Dutch colony and a large number of slaves and convicts were brought in from Bengal and South India. The trend followed during the French colonial period as well. With the British occupying the island in 1810 and the indentured labour system being established from the 1830s in order to meet the requirements of the sugarcane industry, Indian presence in Mauritius entered a whole new period.
With South Indians occupying the largest number among the Indian migrants, Tamil had turned into the most influential language of communication among them. However, over time the largest number of indentured labourers were brought in from Hindi and Bhojpuri speaking areas of North and East India. The Indian presence from these regions in Mauritius was so strong that till date, Bhojpuri which is often used synonymously with Hindi, remains one of the most popular languages on the island.
The Mauritians continue to consider Hindi to be an important part of their history, culture, and identity. Recently, at the 11th World Hindi Conference held at Port Louis, Member of Parliament, Anerood Jugnauth announced that Mauritius would put in all effort to support the recognition of Hindi as an official language in the United Nations. “We refer to India as ‘Bharat Mata’, which makes Mauritius its son. The son knows his duty,” he had said at the conference.
Singapore
When the country gained independence in 1965, the new constitution granted official status to four languages – English and one for each of the largest ethnic groups. Therefore, Mandarin for the Chinese, Malay for the Malays and Tamil for the Indians, apart from English, became the four official languages of the country. Even though Tamil is recognised as the official language in the nation, Hindi continues to remain one of the most popular Indian languages in the country. The reason for choosing Tamil over Hindi was that Tamils constituted the largest group among the Indian migrants in Singapore and in the 1960s, the Dravidian movement in India with its anti-Hindi agenda had its ripple effect in the country.
However, lack of official recognition of Hindi in Singapore, despite the large number of its speakers, had led to widespread ramifications, particularly in the education sector that followed a bilingual policy of teaching students English along with one of the three other official languages. The policy turned out to be a setback for a large number of non-Tamil Indians in Singapore. As a result in 1992, the Ministry of Education in Singapore recognised five other Indian languages (Hindi, Punjabi, Urdu, Gujarati and Bengali) to be taught at schools.