Ranji Trophy 2019-20: BCCI commentators spark controversy after referring to Hindi as 'national language of India'

One of the common misconceptions in India is that Hindi is the national language of the country. This is far from the truth, in fact, India does not have a national language. Hindi is one of the official languages of the country. An instance of this glaring misconception came to light during a Ranji Trophy match between Karnataka and Baroda at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bangalore.

On Thursday, the commentators during the Ranji match said Hindi is the national language of the country and every Indian must learn to speak the language.

"Hindustan meh har hindustani ko Hindi aani chahiye. Yeh hamari matru bhasha hai. Isse badi bhasha hamare liye nahin hain." (Every Indian must know Hindi. This is our mother tongue. There is no bigger language than this), one of the commentators said on air.

In response, another commentator said, "Bilkul sahi kahe rahe ho aap. Meh un logon ko badi krodh ki nigahon se dekhta hun jo kabhi kehte hain ki bhai hum cricketer hain phir bhi Hindi bolte hain. Arre bhai bharat meh rehte hain toh bharat ki bhasha bolenge. Isme garv ki kya baat hai?" (You're absolutely right. In fact, I look at those people with a lot of anger who say that we are cricketers but we also talk in Hindi. You are staying in India so you will obviously speak the language. Why are you taking it as matter of pride?).

A video clip of the match with the comments has been circulating on social media and it resulted in a lot of heated comments from the users, who thought the commentators were completely wrong in claiming that Hindi is the national language of the country.

Later, one of the commentators Rajender Amarnath issued a statement regarding his comments. According to The Indian Express Amarnath said, "We always respect all the languages which are spoken in this country and if it has hurt anybody then my sincere apologies to everybody. Please do not take it in any other way except we were just discussing that we love to speak that language as you love to speak your language. India is a country where many languages are spoken and each region has its own mother tongue and we respect everybody’s language."

Did this lunatic commentator just say “Every Indian should know Hindi” ? What on earth do you think you’re ⁦@BCCI⁩ ? Stop imposing Hindi and disseminating wrong messages. Kindly atone. Every Indian need not know Hindi #StopHindiImposition #RanjiTrophy #KARvBRD pic.twitter.com/thS57yyWJx

— Ramachandra.M/ ರಾಮಚಂದ್ರ.ಎಮ್ (@nanuramu) February 13, 2020

For the uninitiated, here you go again: India DOES NOT have a national language, and you can't impose a language or a culture on anyone. If you still do have any doubts, read up on the Constitution and not lousy WhatsApp forwards #StopHindiImposition #RanjiTrophy #KARvBRD https://t.co/Iwv37kW1yA — Arun Venugopal (@scarletrun) February 13, 2020