LINGUISTIC DIVERSITY: AN ASPECT OF MULTICULTURALISM IS A PROBLEM TO NATIONAL INTEGRATION IN INDIA

Abstract

India is a multinational country with many sub-nations which are proud of their own cultures. The linguistic survey of India on different occasion has soon that there are more than thousands mother tongues including various languages and dialects. These linguistic diversity has always been posing a great threat to national unity or integration which means a people living in a territorial unit having a national authority and as value consensus. National integration is a problem of many countries but in India the problem is most comprehensive. One of the barriers to the achievement of national integration in India is the existence of strong hold of sub-national loyalties on account of linguistic diversities. However linguistic diversity did not pose a great problem for compromises and consensus among the people during the independence struggle.
After independence politicization of language has tended to threaten our national integration on the controversies over the linguistic re-organisation of the state, the official language, etc. Yet it can be said that a single language for national identity is hardly possible in India. The solution of language problem for establishing national unity in India must be a pluralist one.