Over the past year, Bihar Chief Minister and Janata Dal (United) leader Nitish Kumar has been acquiring a reputation for frequent public outbursts, often followed by lengthy apologies. He has lashed out at several people, including current and former political allies, bureaucrats, and even a farmer, over various issues.
However, the use of English instead of Hindi has drawn his ire the most. The Bihar Chief Minister lost his cool in public meetings over the use of English on at least four occasions this year, most recently at the meeting of the INDIA bloc in Delhi on December 19. As per sources, he fumed when DMK Lok Sabha MP T.R. Baalu asked for a translation of his Hindi speech. Mr. Kumar reportedly said Hindi is the national language and everyone should be able to understand it. He launched into details of the freedom struggle and the ‘imposition’ of English.
Earlier in February, Mr. Kumar shouted at a farmer for speaking in English during a programme organised by the Agriculture Department.
The following month, he expressed displeasure at Bihar Legislative Council Chairperson Devesh Chandra Thakur after seeing an LED screen inside the Council displaying information in English. “What is the point? Hindi ko khatm kar dijiyega kya [Do you intend to finish off Hindi]?” the JD(U) leader had said.
And in September, at an event to inaugurate a hospital in Bihar’s Banka district, Mr. Kumar lost his cool again over the use of English signboards within the hospital premises.
Mr. Kumar’s recurring public disapproval of English comes against the backdrop of an intense struggle to hold on to his rural social base comprising people mostly from Extremely Backward Classes (EBCs). The State has produced several social justice leaders for whom anti-English, pro-Hindi rhetoric was a staple. However, the issue may not resonate as widely today among the EBCs, many of whom see English as a vehicle for upward social and economic mobility.
Mr. Kumar owes a lot to socialist leaders such as Ram Manohar Lohia and Karpoori Thakur, who advocated the use of the native language so that people deprived of an English-medium education do not feel excluded from public life. Thakur had even launched a campaign against English called ‘Angrezi Hatao’, with the slogan ‘Angrezi mein kaam na hoga, phir se desh ghulam na hoga [There will be no work in English; the country won’t be enslaved again]’. As Bihar’s Deputy Chief Minister and Education Minister, Thakur had in 1967 also abolished the need to pass the paper on English at the matriculation level, which is a rule that exists in the State till today. Such was the prevailing sentiment against the language that all English typewriters were removed from the Secretariat in 1972.
Mr. Kumar has lately shot off his mouth on subjects other than English as well. Last month, he spoke on the issue of family planning in the Assembly, sparking controversy, with many terming his speech “culturally inappropriate”. He had to apologise for his remarks on the floor of the House the following day.
Two days later, again in the Assembly, he fulminated against former Chief Minister and Hindustani Awam Morcha-Secular founder Jitan Ram Manjhi, saying it was due to his [Mr. Kumar’s] “stupidity” that he had made Mr. Manjhi the Chief Minister.
Then there is the question of Mr. Kumar’s role in the INDIA bloc. Many JD(U) leaders have projected their party chief as a prospective convener of the Opposition alliance and its prime ministerial candidate, even as Mr. Kumar has denied harbouring such ambitions. Such a role has eluded him so far.
Some political observers believe that Mr. Kumar is frustrated over the continuous pressure from Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD), the ruling alliance partner in Bihar, to hand over the State’s reins to Deputy Chief Minister Tejashwi Yadav. After Mr. Kumar snapped ties with the BJP last year and came to power with the help of the RJD, there were talks that he would leave the Chief Minister’s chair for Mr. Yadav after serving for six months. However, more than a year has passed and the public attacks on Mr. Kumar by some RJD leaders over the issue have only intensified.
Other observers, however, believe that the veteran socialist, who learnt English as an engineering student, is reviving the old line partly as a cultural antidote to the BJP’s Hindutva politics.
