 "RS: MoS Rai may move motion for election to committee on Official Language")
Union Minister of State for Home Affairs Nityanand Rai is likely to move a motion in the Rajya Sabha later on Monday for election to the Committee of Parliament on Official Language.
Rai is set to move the motion during the business of the Upper House after it will assemble for the day at 2 pm.
Union Home Minister Amit Shah is the Chairperson of the Official Language Committee.
"In pursuance of sub-section (2) of Section 4 of the Official Languages Act, 1963 (19 of 1963), this House does proceed to elect, in the manner as directed by the Chairman, two Members from amongst the Members of the House to be members of the Committee on Official Language in an existing vacancy and another that will arise on the 1 August 2022, due to the retirement of Dr Subhash Chandra from the membership of the Rayya Sabha," mentions revised list of business of Rajya Sabha.
Under Article, 344 (4) of the Constitution, a Committee of Parliament on Official Language was constituted with 30 members (20 from Lok Sabha and 10 from Rajya Sabha) in September 1957 and on November 16, 1957, its first meeting was convened.
The then Union Home Minister Govind Vallabh Pant presented its report to the President on February 8, 1959, after a detailed discussion in its 26 meetings. The Commission and the Committee both were of the view that the use of English, after January 26, 1965, be continued as a co-official language.
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The Committee suggested that the medium of English in the examinations for the recruitment to the All India Services and Higher Central Services should be continued and later on Hindi may be introduced as an optional medium.
A discussion was carried out on the Report in the Lok Sabha from September 2 to 4, 1959 and in the Rajya Sabha from September 8 to 9, 1959.
The Prime Minister gave a statement in the Lok Sabha on 4th September. 1959. While clarifying broadly the Government's stand on the Official Language, he repeatedly said that English be made as an associate or additional language and it can be used in correspondence by any state with the Government of India or with other states. Further, he clarified that till such time the non-Hindi speaking states agree to stop using English, no time limit would be laid down in this regard.
Home Minister Shah in April this year presided over the 37th meeting of the Parliamentary Official Language committee here in the national capital and said that the pace at which the current committee is working has rarely been seen before.
In the meeting, Shah said that the time has come to make the Official Language an important part of the unity of the country. He had said that when citizens of States who speak other languages, communicate with each other, it should be in the language of India.
The Minister said that Hindi should be accepted as an alternative to English and not to local languages.
Shah had said that unless we make Hindi flexible by accepting words from other local languages, it would not be propagated.
Now 70 per cent of the agenda of the Cabinet is prepared in Hindi and 22,000 Hindi teachers have been recruited in the eight states of the North East. Also, nine tribal communities of the North East have converted their dialects' scripts to Devanagari.
Apart from this, all the eight states of the North East have agreed to make Hindi compulsory in schools up to Class 10.
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