Chennai: Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M K Stalin has said that the BJP-led Indian government is using the “so-called three-language formula” as a covert mechanism to expand Hindi into non-Hindi speaking regions of India.
According to Kashmir Media Service, speaking at a rally in Erode, Stalin, also president of the ruling Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK), criticized the Central Board of Secondary Education’s (CBSE) recently unveiled curriculum framework, aligned with the National Education Policy 2020, calling it a calculated attempt at linguistic imposition rather than an academic reform.
He said that under the guise of promoting “Indian languages”, the BJP-led NDA government was aggressively advancing a centralising agenda that privileges Hindi while systematically marginalising India’s rich and diverse linguistic heritage. “For students in southern states, this framework effectively translates into “compulsory Hindi learning.”
“The so-called three-language formula is, in reality, a covert strategy to enforce Hindi learning in southern states,” Stalin said. “Yet, where is the reciprocity? Will students in Hindi-speaking states be mandated to learn Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, Malayalam—or even Bengali and Marathi? The absence of such clarity exposes the policy’s one-sided and discriminatory nature.”
Stalin highlighted the BJP government’s failure to make Tamil mandatory in Kendriya Vidyalaya Sangathan schools and to appoint adequate Tamil teachers, describing the new policy as “rank hypocrisy.”
“This is not merely a question of language. It is a question of fairness, federalism, and equal opportunity,” he said. “By structurally privileging Hindi-speaking students, this policy risks creating entrenched advantages in higher education and employment, further widening regional disparities.”
Stalin warned that at a time when the world is moving forward at an unprecedented pace, India’s children must be prepared for the future. “The BJP Government appears determined to impose Hindi, brushing aside the legitimate, consistent, and democratic concerns raised by Tamil Nadu and several other states,” he added.
Notably, under the so-called “three-language formula”, students are required to learn three languages during schooling: a mother tongue/regional language, Hindi (in non-Hindi-speaking states) or another Indian language (in Hindi-speaking states), and English or another modern language.
