Sarayu Pani 
The Union government’s latest attempt to deny funds to Tamil Nadu under the RTE Act for their failure to comply with the “three language formula” and introduce Hindi in schools is a fascinating reminder of how linguistic politics in Tamil Nadu remains a thorn in the side of Hindutva – unlike many other linguistic and regional assertions in the country that have dovetailed quite neatly into Hindu majoritarianism.
In the 1980s, the Gokak agitations in neighbouring Karnataka were the largest protest against the three language formula at the time. Beginning in intellectual circles, and led by the leading Kannada writers of the time, the movement attained mass status once it was supported by the Kannada film industry. And yet, Gokak did not really create a change in the nature of Kannadiga identity that outlived the movement. Without this grounding, the mass politics aspects of the language movement in Karnataka were soon reduced to being a convenient tool to wield against any group being politically targeted at the time.
Scholars agree that identities are not an automatic or inevitable outcome of cultural differences. This is true for linguistic identity as well. The objective fact of sharing a language is not usually sufficient to create an identity. The creation of a linguistic identity involves an element of choice – sufficient members of the group must be seen speaking that particular language as essential or critical to their identity. The movements that create this consensus, and the terms on which such consensus is created, then become the politics of that identity.
Linguistic or regional assertions within the subcontinent therefore differ quite widely from each other, based on how the identity in question came into being in its modern form. These differences also shape how these movements respond when they come into contact with larger nationalist ideologies – whether Nehruvian nationalism or more recently, Hindutva.
Understanding why Tamil linguistic assertion remains both successful against Hindi imposition (Tamil Nadu remains the only state that has never included Hindi in schools) and relatively immune to the pull of Hindutva lies in its roots – Dravidian nationalism organised around the twin rejections of Brahmanism and the related linguistic influence of Sanskrit.
Dravidian movement
When the South Indian Liberation Federation (later named the Justice Party) was founded in 1916 in the Madras Presidency, its stated aim was to render social justice to the non-Brahmin caste groups. But while the Dravidian movement is often spoken of today as an anti-caste movement, it is perhaps better understood as nationalist movement. And while the demand for separate nation was dropped in the 1950s, the essential thrust of Dravidian politics, including a recent claim about the origins of the Iron Age, remain civilisational distinctness from what is described as the Aryan north. Both the linguistic and the caste justice aspects of this movement are intricately linked to this.
In the Dravidian narrative, non-Brahmins in Tamil Nadu were identified racially and culturally as Dravidian while Brahmins were seen as Aryan, and originating in north India. The caste system was therefore challenged as an Aryan imposition and Dravidians were asked to disregard caste based notions of pollution, segregation and rank. Further, sanskritic scriptural tradition was challenged and the role of Brahmins in rituals like marriages or funerals was rejected in favour of ceremonies solemnised by community elders.
Like all budding nationalisms of the time, the Dravidian movement also focussed on first declaring its sovereignty in the cultural domain, specifically in the domain of language. And if Sanskrit, and its modern north Indian derivative, Hindi, were seen as the languages of the Aryan, Tamil was portrayed as the ancient (and uncorrupted) language of the Dravidian. By the end of the 19th century, several ancient Tamil texts began to appear in print. These classics, including the legend of Kannagi, a Tamil goddess of chastity, and texts like Thirukkural provided the foundations for a literary tradition that would lay claim to an ancient culture, independent of Sanskrit, whose custodians would be non-Brahmins.
Hindi imposition in this ideological framework (first attempted in 1937) was seen as an extension of the sanskritic scriptural tradition and consequently as a form of religious and political bondage to the politics of northern India, and its Brahmanism.
Mass intellectualism
While the Dravidian movement under the Justice Party was originally filled with somewhat elite and wealthy non-Brahmins, E.V. Ramaswamy (“Periyar”) was to change that. Periyar attracted non-Brahmins from a far more diverse class spectrum, who were drawn to his promise of restoring pride and dignity to the non-Brahmin youth.
The politics of Periyar’s Self Respect Union was not limited to criticisms of Brahmanism. It involved the organisation and dissemination of an independent Tamil history and culture untouched by Sanskrit. The Self Respect Union became a training ground for an entire generation of thinkers, writers and public speakers who would then go on to articulate a comprehensive system of Tamil thought, myth, morality, ritual and values culled from the ancient Tamil texts, and communicate this system to the masses – initially through their hugely popular public speeches and writing, and later through the medium of film.
Also read: Why the Three-Language Formula Threatens South India
The masses in this form of Tamil cultural education were not limited to being passive recipients of information. For example, primary school teachers, who were themselves often literate only in Tamil, were at the forefront of spreading Dravidian ideology in the villages. This long tradition has meant that unlike linguistic assertions in many other states, the ideological commitment to Tamil runs well beyond specific triggers or flashpoints, like migration.
Decolonisation, language and Hindutva
Understanding the Dravidian movement as a nationalist movement with roots as old as anti-colonial nationalism is important to decipher why the argument of Hindi as essential to decolonisation repeatedly fails to land in Tamil Nadu.
Elsewhere in the subcontinent, overall control of the anti-colonial national movement remained quite predominantly upper caste. Indian nationalists saw replacing English with Hindi as essential to cultural decolonisation. While there were some internal differences between nationalists on the type of Hindi (or Hindustani) to be enforced, or the method of its enforcement, it was pretty generally agreed that dispensing with English as a link language was critical to decolonisation.
While this thinking found some takers in other southern Indian regions, in the Dravidian movement, liberation from Brahmin hegemony (and its linguistic tool, Sanskrit) took precedence over liberation from British colonialism, which was seen as something that could be dealt with after the dismantling of Brahmin hegemonies. In 1937, when Congress chief minister C. Rajagopalachari attempted to make Hindi compulsory in schools, Periyar himself organised the opposition. This gained the Dravidian movement considerable support from the student community.
Post independence, the Nehruvian approach to Hindi imposition (often handicapped by his own technocratic approach to governance, which was far more easily accomplished in English) was to make repeated (and often ignored) suggestions, reflected in a series of education policies dating back to the 1960s. Regional assertions were quelled and absorbed back into the nationalist fold with a policy of ad hoc linguistic concessions (such as the reorganisation of states) and generally letting sleeping issues lie.
This most recent Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) attempt to hammer Hindi into Tamil Nadu using financial pressure demonstrates a far greater urgency and also a tacit recognition by the BJP that Dravidian nationalism and Hindutva cannot electorally co-exist.
Also read: Pradhan Defensive on Three-Language Controversy, Tamil Nadu MPs Angry at Being Called ‘Uncivilised’
While the electoral base of Hindutva today has unquestionably moved beyond its original upper caste bastions to include OBCs and Dalits, its ideologies remain distinctly Brahmanical. The focus on sanskritic civilisation, on cow slaughter prohibitions and on upper caste practices like vegetarianism and ritual purity – is core to the ideology. While the oppressed castes are allowed to participate as enforcers of these values – as voters, as members of cow slaughter vigilante groups or to enact “love jihad” vendettas against Muslims or Dalits – the ideology is still set and located in what Christophe Jaffrelot terms upper-caste orthopraxy.
This is the ideological battle which is being enacted in Tamil Nadu today. While it seems clear that the BJP, for all their bluster, does not expect Hindi in schools to be a winning electoral platform in the near future, their willingness to put it on the agenda indicates that they see that the long term future of Hindutva in Tamil Nadu depends on the dismantling of Dravidian nationalism. Hindi is only the first salvo.
Sarayu Pani is a lawyer by training and posts on X @sarayupani.
Missing Link is her new column on the social aspects of the events that move India.