UPSC's recent decision to restrict regional languages as mediums for the civil services exam will negatively impact applicants from rural areas of India and could exacerbate political tensions around language issues. While Hindi remains an option, restricting other languages to only graduates of those language's literature is an unreasonable restriction. There are many examples of successful civil servants who wrote the exam in their native language without having a literature degree in that language. The language policy should encourage, not compel, the use of languages and allow exams to be taken in major regional Indian languages to avoid mistakes of the past that have proven disastrous and divisive.

1. Where The UPSC Is Going Wrong
With Its Decision To Restrict
Language Choices
By Raghawendra Deo

2. The language barrier
• In the beginning, the Indian bureaucratic class was not an all
pervasive one.
• It was heaven for the pass-outs of public schools perched in
some serene hill stations or the metros.
• The reason being – English was the only language for
answering the Civil Services examination paper.
• The skew in favour of elite was removed by allowing regional
languages also as medium of expression in Civil Services
examination after the recommendation of Satish Chandra
Committee.
• That is why we find that since 1988, a growing percentage of
candidates qualifying for the highly coveted services hail
from moffussil towns.

3. When the law changed
• UPSC’s recent decision to restrict other regional languages as
medium of expression will not only have a negative impact on
the number of applicants from the interiors of the nation but
could also have the potential to vitiate political climate on the
language issue.
• To make the matter worse, the exam board has kept open –
the option for writing the exams in Hindi.
• Sure, the aspirants from the hinterland of Hindi belt have an
edge over the similarly placed non-Hindi candidates, but the
option to write the examination in your local language is
there, only if the aspirant is a graduate in the literature of
that language.
• This rider is ridiculous!

4. Not a comparison
• It does not hold true that only a graduate in literature of a
language is always a good writer in that language and can
express his thought concisely, coherently and with brevity as
required by UPSC – and that the one who does not have a
graduate in literature of the language cannot.
• There are umpteen examples of people qualifying the UPSC
examinations by writing in their preferred local language but
not necessarily graduate in that language.
• Have they proved to be bad administrators?

5. Persuasion rather than compulsion
• Language has always been a thorny issue in the Indian polity.
• The two language formula has proven to be disastrous and
divisive in a multi-lingual India.
• The discontent caused by the perceived threat to non-Hindi
people and their culture was somehow settled by adopting
the three-language formula whereby other regional
languages were given equal importance.
• Hindi became a matter of persuasion rather than compulsion.

6. Let all language flourish
• At the same time, Hindi also set its foot in non-Hindi belt and
became a pan-India language and established itself as linking
language for India; thanks to Hindi cinema and TV serials.
• The official language policy has not had a desirable effect on
the propagation of Hindi as yet.
• Let the cinema and songs do their job of popularizing the
language.
• Let the Govt not commit the lingo mistake.
• The option should be open to take exams in all the major
regional Indian languages.

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