News about friction between Hindi speakers and Kannada speakers keeps popping up with alarming regularity nowadays. After every such incident, both sides come out with knives and daggers on Reddit and X. Reading those repetitive exchanges is now extremely tedious. What stands out though is the active participation of those who don’t even have a skin in the game – foul mouthed people from northern states who have probably never stepped out of their towns. As a north Indian residing in Bangalore, I do not want these people batting for me. They vitiate the atmosphere in social media and the ones actually living here have to live amongst an antagonised local population.

In an ideal world, Indians would have been provided education on respecting all regional languages, and told that Hindi is not the national language of India, just because it has the largest speaker base. In an ideal world, the capital of India should also have been shifted from Delhi to some place more central. It is unfortunate that the willingness of non-Hindi speakers to learn some amount of Hindi is now being used against them to say that all of India speaks Hindi, and therefore it is the natural choice for national language.

Hindi speakers are able to get by in southern states because the locals have walked half way. They have made an effort to learn Hindi. Hindi speakers do not want to walk even an inch. One can say that language cannot be forced. Fine. So when you are in a non Hindi speaking state, dealing with someone who does not know Hindi, do not get all antsy. Do not act entitled that the local person should have known Hindi. No, the local person has no obligation to learn your language. You have no obligation to learn their language either, but then accept with grace that you will find yourselves in inconvenient situations.

Hindi speakers must accept another inconvenient truth. That their unwillingness to learn other languages is not just a matter of ability, but also rooted in disdain for other languages. Growing up in Delhi for 5 years and then working in NCR for 2 years, I have seen many examples of people making fun of South Indian accent. Even Bengalis have their accent mocked sometimes. This arrogance is alarmingly stupid. South Indians are not queueing up work in companies in the North. The traffic is entirely in the opposite direction. What use is learning Hindi for a South Indian except for communicating with North Indian colleagues? But for that English is always there.

The constant reminder that ‘this is one country’ is really silly. Everyone knows this is one country. No is asking you to get a visa to work in Karnataka or Tamil Nadu. No one is saying you can’t buy property or work or vote in another state. This really is a combination of 1) unwillingness to learn and 2) lack of respect for India’s diversity masquerading as patriotism.

My father’s government job took us to West Bengal, Bihar, MP, Delhi, Maharashtra and Gujarat. My jobs took me to Karnataka, Andhra, Maharashtra, NCR, Tamil Nadu and Kerala. I consider myself fortunate that I have lived and breathed India. When someone asks me where I am from, I do not have an answer, and I am proud of it, because I can say without any hesitation that I am an Indian. I am an Indian that recognises that all states are equal, all languages are equal, all cultures are equal.