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Official Languages in Indian Sub Continent and Solution to Eliminate Racist Division in Sri Lanka

T Sabarutnam Alambil Mullaitivu

Hindi is the official language of the Indian Union (although it also recognises 15 or 16 other regional languages as official). Still, it is the native language of only about a third of all Indians. Those who don't grow up speaking Hindi must learn it at school. Very little Hindi is spoken in the south of India, where dominant languages are completely unrelated to those of the north.

Urdu is the official language of Pakistan. It is also the official language of the Indian state of Jammu & Kashmir and one of the two official languages of the southern Indian state of Andhra Pradesh.

Like Hindi, Urdu is not the native language of most Pakistanis. For only about 10% of Pakistanis, primarily those living in Karachi and other cities of Sindh province, speak it as their mother tongue. The remaining Pakistanis grow up speaking Punjabi, Sindhi, Baluchi, Pashto, Kashmiri or other languages and must learn Urdu at school. In fact, India has about ten times the number of native speakers of Urdu as Pakistan.

But this situation is changing because the Pakistani state has so thoroughly suffused the country with Urdu. Many of today's young Pakistanis for whose parents Urdu is not the mother tongue, have grown up speaking Urdu as though it was.

Similarly majority of Sri Lankan kids with Tamil speaking parents are now living in traditionally Sinhala speaking areas and growing up speaking Sinhala as well. Language will not become a subject of racist division in few years if all the Sri Lankan children learn Sinhala and Tamil.

It has been the proud privilege of the Sri Lankans to live in harmony with one another. That has been the basis of Sri Lanka's culture from the days of Asoka, 2300 years ago. This has been repeatedly declared and practised. Let us endeavour to rebuild the brotherhood that once existed between the Sinhala and Tamil speaking Sri Lankans. It is the only way forward to usher in peace and prosperity once more to this beautiful country of ours that has been torn apart by war and strife.

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