Week-Long ‘Hindi Diwas’ concludes with prize distribution

Aligarh: Swati, Aqalima Wasif and Nasreen were declared the winners in the ‘research scholars’ category of various competitions held in the past week at the Department of Hindi to celebrate ‘Hindi Diwas’, the day when Hindi was adapted as the official language by the Constituent Assembly in 1949.

Alpana, Rashi and Bharat won the competitions in the postgraduate group; while Waseem, Avinash, Fahad and Shadan were declared as the undergraduate winners. Divesh, Shobit, Shahnawaz and Nazar Haider won in the employees category.

Presiding over the valedictory session, AMU Vice Chancellor, Prof Tariq Mansoor said: The ‘Hindi Diwas’ shows the importance of the Hindi language and inspires younger generations to adopt the language more and more.

Pressing for the need for teaching school children in the mother tongues, the Vice Chancellor stressed that National Education Policy, 2020 has come as a boon for further raising popularity of Hindi and other native Indian languages as it advocates for a medium of instruction in the mother tongue and other local languages at least till Grade 5, and preferably till Grade 8 and beyond for both public and private schools.

The Chief Guest, Prof Krishna Murari Mishra (Former Dean, Faculty of Arts) remarked: “It is to be noted that Hindi language was central to the Indian freedom movement. Mahatma Gandhi called Hindi the language of the masses and talked about making Hindi the national language of the Nation. Historians have also found letters and other manuscripts from the medieval times in India written in the Hindi language”.

“Today the Hindi language faces major challenges in Information Technology (IT) and I hope that soon a day will come when major developments in IT will also be done in Hindi”, he added.

Delivering the welcome address, Prof Mohd Ashiq Ali (Chairman, Department of Hindi and Secretary, Raj Bhasha-Hindi Implementation Committee) explained how the Constituent Assembly of India had, in 1949, recognised and adopted Hindi—written in the Devanagari script —as the official language of the country.

Prof S Imtiaz Hasnain (Dean, Faculty of Arts) distributed prizes to the winners.

Prof M Shahul Hameed presented the programme report and Prof Shambhunath conducted the programme.

Prof Meraj Ahmad extended the vote of thanks.