Chief Minister Siddaramaiah on Tuesday rued the lack of a conducive atmosphere for the growth of the Kannada language even 68 years after the unification of the erstwhile ‘Mysore state’ and 50 years of the state getting the name ‘Karnataka’.
Calling Kannadigas "way too generous", he said this "shortcoming" was hindering the growth of the Kannada language, its culture and traditions.
"What we do is, we don’t teach our language to others, but we learn their language. We must teach others our language. We talk in Urdu with those who speak Urdu, speak in Hindi with those speaking Hindi and Tamil with Tamil people," Siddaramaiah said during the launch of the ‘Karnataka Suvarna Sambhrama’ logo.
"I would say that this is not a good development for the growth of language, culture and tradition of the state," he added.
Noting that Karnataka has many people who speak different languages, Siddaramaiah said there are people who speak their languages at home and they do not know Kannada at all.
"Everyone who resides here should learn to speak Kannada. We too have a responsibility to create an environment and a necessity for Kannada, an effort we did not make," the chief minister lamented.
In this context, he said anyone can "survive" here without even knowing Kannada.
"Can we survive by speaking only in Kannada in Tamil Nadu, Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, Kerala or Uttar Pradesh? However, in Karnataka one can survive without knowing Kannada. That is the difference we have compared to the neighbouring states. We Kannadigas are very generous," Siddaramaiah pointed out.
He said he would not ask people not to learn or speak other languages, but they should realise that there is a need to create an environment and a necessity to speak Kannada in Karnataka.
"68 years have passed since the unification of the state happened. If we are still saying that we can not create an environment for Kannada, then we must have some shortcomings. We are way too generous," the chief minister opined.
According to him, Kannadigas do not teach others Kannada. Instead, they learn others’ language.
The chief minister, however, asked people not to hate others' language and religion, but they should not forget their own.
"I won’t say that people don’t have love and pride for Kannada or they have zero pride for Kannada, but one should not be too generous".
The chief minister announced that the state will celebrate the golden jubilee of embracing the name Karnataka for the state from November 1, 2023 for the next one year.
As part of ‘Karnataka Sambhrama’ (Karnataka Celebration), various cultural and traditional programmes will be organised in various parts of the state to create awareness among the masses about Kannada, he explained.
Dwelling on the history behind the name ‘Karnataka’, Siddaramaiah said in 1973, the erstwhile Mysuru state got the name of Karnataka based on Alur Venkataraya’s book called ‘Karnataka Gatavaibhava’, who had called the entire region as Karnataka.
On November 1, 1973, the state got its name Karnataka and the state had completed 50 years with that name, he noted.
According to him, Karnataka should have celebrated the golden jubilee last year itself, which the previous BJP government failed to do.
"In this year’s budget I had mentioned November 1 an important day because the state got a new name. It will be a fault on our part if we don’t celebrate the name given to our state," the chief minister noted.
The ‘Karnataka Suvarna Sambhrama’ will be an echo of the famous slogan ‘Hesarayitu Karnataka, Usirayitu Kannada’ (Karnataka is the name and Kannada is the breath), he told the gathering.
-With PTI Input
