Students of the JNU has alleged that the university is trying to impose Hindi on the students by making it a compulsory subject at the undergraduate BA and BTech courses. The students’ body, JNUSU (Jawaharlal Nehru University Students' Union), that one of the agenda of the 151st meeting of the academic council was to "make Hindi a compulsory subject at undergraduate level for BA and BTech courses".
According to the JNUSU, making Hindi compulsory is a response to a letter received last October from the Ministry of Human Resource Development, "in which it has been requested that along with making Hindi a compulsory subject in all the schools and universities of India, appropriate and necessary action should be taken to encourage the usage of Hindi in the government offices as well".
"Many of the students come from non-Hindi speaking states with no prior experience in Hindi. Hindi, however, is an optional subject at the BA level. There is already enough opportunity for students who wish to learn Hindi," it said.
They added that the "fallacy" of making Hindi a compulsory subject for B.Tech do not even demand much explanation.
"This move by the JNU administration is nothing but part and parcel of the concerted plan by the ruling Sangh Parivar to forcefully impose Hindi in educational institutions and disregard the linguistic diversity in these institutions and our country," the JNUSU said. Chintamani Mahapatra,
rector-I of the JNU said: "No decision has been taken that may be considered imposition of Hindi."