Kashmir: Fears dampen celebrations at Hindu festival – DW – 06/04/2025
in Srinagar
06/04/2025
June 4, 2025
Hundreds of Kashmiri Hindus, commonly referred to as Pandits, participated in the annual Kheer Bhawani Mela festival — the first major religious event since the Pahalgam attack, which saw 26 Indian tourists killed.
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DW
2 days ago
- DW
Language rows rage in India as ruling party pushes Hindi – DW – 07/15/2025
People who speak English in India will "soon feel ashamed," according to a senior government minister from the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party. But the party's efforts to promote Hindi are facing an escalating backlash. India's Home Minister Amit Shah recently said that those who speak English in the South Asian country would "soon feel ashamed." He also urged people to speak their mother tongue with pride. "I believe that the languages of our country are the jewels of our culture. Without our languages, we cease to be truly Indian," he said. He emphasized that India should lead globally through its own languages instead of using English. Prime Minister Narendra Modi's government has also been increasingly giving precedence to Hindi over English in official work. Legal directives require Hindi in official communication, documentation, courts, and recruitment, especially in Hindi-speaking states, aiming to boost Hindi's role and reduce dependence on English. The push to elevate Hindi, however, has been controversial — particularly in non-Hindi-speaking states. Language is a touchy subject in the world's most populous country, where its 1.4 billion people speak a mosaic of over a hundred languages and thousands of dialects. India does not have a single "national language." Instead, it now has 22 official languages. At the federal level, both Hindi and English are designated as official languages, while individual states have adopted one or more regional languages as their official languages. The nation's internal, state boundaries are also drawn mostly along linguistic lines. Hindi is the country's most-spoken language with more than 43% of the population (more than 528 million people) able to communicate in it, as per the last census held in 2011. It's followed by Bengali, Marathi, Telugu and Tamil. "Unlike Western nation-states that are mostly monolingual, India embraces multiple official languages, reflecting its rich linguistic diversity, from which this tension arises," said Dwaipayan Bhattacharya, a professor at the Center for Political Studies at Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi. To view this video please enable JavaScript, and consider upgrading to a web browser that supports HTML5 video Attempts were made in the past to make Hindi the sole official language at the federal level, but they all met stiff resistance in non-Hindi-speaking regions. Modi's ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), however, has long campaigned for the promotion of Hindi. Prafulla Ketkar, editor of Organizer, the mouthpiece of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), the BJP's ideological parent, said, "English as a colonial legacy should be replaced by Indian languages. Hindi serves as a communication medium with the Union without undermining other languages, as every Indian language holds national importance." While the BJP insists it wants to promote all native Indian languages — not just Hindi — its attempts to expand the usage of Hindi have been contentious, with critics accusing New Delhi of trying to impose Hindi on non-Hindi-speaking states. Southern states, whose languages don't have much in common with Hindi, have particularly opposed the Hindi push. "Hindi is as foreign for non-Hindi-speaking states as English," said Samuel Asir Raj, a sociologist and formerly a professor at Manonmaniam Sundaranar University in Tirunelveli. In the western state of Maharashtra, which is run by the BJP, the government recently announced that young pupils would be taught Hindi as a third language. But a fierce backlash quickly forced it to scrap the move. In Tamil Nadu, Chief Minister MK Stalin has been engaged in a bitter row with Modi's government over language policy. The dispute centers around India's National Education Policy (NEP), first introduced in 1968 and recently updated by the Modi government in 2020. The original policy envisioned a three-language formula. Hindi-speaking states in northern India had to teach Hindi, English and a third Indian language in school. Non-Hindi-speaking states, meanwhile, would teach the regional language, Hindi and English. When revised in 2020, the NEP retained the three-language formula but offered more flexibility for states to choose the three languages. It, however, mandated that at least two of the languages must be native to India, although Hindi is not mandatory. Tamil Nadu, though, has remained a fierce opponent of the policy and wanted to stick with teaching its school children just two languages — Tamil and English. And it views the three-language plan as an attempt to impose Hindi on the state through the backdoor. Concerns over federalism and cultural identity have also fueled resistance. "South India's opposition to the NEP isn't about Hindi itself, but about the central government using the policy to culturally appropriate their identity," said Raj, the sociologist. Despite the Modi government's push for Hindi, the use of English in India remains widespread, including in education, commerce and courts, even in Hindi-speaking regions. People across the country view learning the language as key to upward economic and social mobility. They increasingly send their children to English-medium schools, in the hope that it would help them gain access to better and higher-paying jobs. Against this backdrop, it's unlikely that Hindi will completely replace English in India anytime soon. But Hindi has been spreading across the country in recent years, thanks to the Hindi film industry, or Bollywood, which has popularized the Hindi language in non-Hindi-speaking areas. Migration from northern, Hindi-speaking regions to southern states has also contributed to the spread. Bhattacharya said the Modi government's "heavy financial support" for Hindi "creates a sense of imposition." He called for a dialogue between New Delhi and state governments to put an end to the language disputes."Unity should not mean uniformity imposed by the state. While this may spark regional opposition, it won't lead to major conflict. Ultimately, dialogue and compromise between the center and states are essential to resolve these tensions."
DW
2 days ago
- DW
India: Language rows erupt as BJP pushes Hindi – DW – 07/15/2025
People who speak English in India would "soon feel ashamed," according to a senior government minister from the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party. But the party's efforts to promote Hindi are facing escalating backlash. India's Home Minister Amit Shah recently said that those who speak English in the South Asian country would "soon feel ashamed." He also urged people to speak their mother tongue with pride. "I believe that the languages of our country are the jewels of our culture. Without our languages, we cease to be truly Indian," he said. He emphasized that India should lead globally through its own languages instead of using English. Prime Minister Narendra Modi's government has also been increasingly giving precedence to Hindi over English in official work. Legal directives require Hindi in official communication, documentation, courts, and recruitment, especially in Hindi-speaking states, aiming to boost Hindi's role and reduce dependence on English. The push to elevate Hindi, however, has been controversial — particularly in non-Hindi-speaking states. Language is a touchy subject in the world's most populous country, where its 1.4 billion people speak a mosaic of over a hundred languages and thousands of dialects. India does not have a single "national language." Instead, it now has 22 official languages. At the federal level, both Hindi and English are designated as official languages, while individual states have adopted one or more regional languages as their official languages. The nation's internal, state boundaries are also drawn mostly along linguistic lines. Hindi is the country's most-spoken language with more than 43% of the population (more than 528 million people) able to communicate in it, as per the last census held in 2011. It's followed by Bengali, Marathi, Telugu and Tamil. "Unlike Western nation-states that are mostly monolingual, India embraces multiple official languages, reflecting its rich linguistic diversity, from which this tension arises," said Dwaipayan Bhattacharya, a professor at the Center for Political Studies at Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi. To view this video please enable JavaScript, and consider upgrading to a web browser that supports HTML5 video Attempts were made in the past to make Hindi the sole official language at the federal level, but they all met stiff resistance in non-Hindi-speaking regions. Modi's ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), however, has long campaigned for the promotion of Hindi. Prafulla Ketkar, editor of Organizer, the mouthpiece of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), the BJP's ideological parent, said, "English as a colonial legacy should be replaced by Indian languages. Hindi serves as a communication medium with the Union without undermining other languages, as every Indian language holds national importance." While the BJP insists it wants to promote all native Indian languages — not just Hindi — its attempts to expand the usage of Hindi have been contentious, with critics accusing New Delhi of trying to impose Hindi on non-Hindi-speaking states. Southern states, whose languages don't have much in common with Hindi, have particularly opposed the Hindi push. "Hindi is as foreign for non-Hindi-speaking states as English," said Samuel Asir Raj, a sociologist and formerly a professor at Manonmaniam Sundaranar University in Tirunelveli. In the western state of Maharashtra, which is run by the BJP, the government recently announced that young pupils would be taught Hindi as a third language. But a fierce backlash quickly forced it to scrap the move. In Tamil Nadu, Chief Minister MK Stalin has been engaged in a bitter row with Modi's government over language policy. The dispute centers around India's National Education Policy (NEP), first introduced in 1968 and recently updated by the Modi government in 2020. The original policy envisioned a three-language formula. Hindi-speaking states in northern India had to teach Hindi, English and a third Indian language in school. Non-Hindi-speaking states, meanwhile, would teach the regional language, Hindi and English. When revised in 2020, the NEP retained the three-language formula but offered more flexibility for states to choose the three languages. It, however, mandated that at least two of the languages must be native to India, although Hindi is not mandatory. Tamil Nadu, though, has remained a fierce opponent of the policy and wanted to stick with teaching its school children just two languages — Tamil and English. And it views the three-language plan as an attempt to impose Hindi on the state through the backdoor. Concerns over federalism and cultural identity have also fueled resistance. "South India's opposition to the NEP isn't about Hindi itself, but about the central government using the policy to culturally appropriate their identity," said Raj, the sociologist. Despite the Modi government's push for Hindi, the use of English in India remains widespread, including in education, commerce and courts, even in Hindi-speaking regions. People across the country view learning the language as key to upward economic and social mobility. They increasingly send their children to English-medium schools, in the hope that it would help them gain access to better and higher-paying jobs. Against this backdrop, it's unlikely that Hindi will completely replace English in India anytime soon. But Hindi has been spreading across the country in recent years, thanks to the Hindi film industry, or Bollywood, which has popularized the Hindi language in non-Hindi-speaking areas. Migration from northern, Hindi-speaking regions to southern states has also contributed to the spread. Bhattacharya said the Modi government's "heavy financial support" for Hindi "creates a sense of imposition." He called for a dialogue between New Delhi and state governments to put an end to the language disputes."Unity should not mean uniformity imposed by the state. While this may spark regional opposition, it won't lead to major conflict. Ultimately, dialogue and compromise between the center and states are essential to resolve these tensions."
DW
2 days ago
- DW
Air India crash: Boeing aircraft in the spotlight – DW – 07/15/2025
India and South Korea have ordered comprehensive checks of Boeing aircraft following the Ahmedabad crash which killed 260 people. A preliminary report indicates fuel switches moving to cutoff position just before impact. The US aircraft manufacturer Boeing finds itself in focus of an international controversy once again, with India and South Korea ordering fuel switch inspections for Boeing jets after a 787-8 Dreamliner crashed in Ahmedabad last month. Individual airlines in Japan and Singapore started their own checks as a precaution, according to the Reuters news agency. To view this video please enable JavaScript, and consider upgrading to a web browser that supports HTML5 video The London-bound Boeing jet collided with a structure just minutes after takeoff. The crash killed 19 people on the ground and all but one of the 242 people onboard the aircraft. Indian officials are still trying to determine the cause of the tragedy. However, the nation's Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau (AAIB) published a preliminary report this week claiming that the fuel switches for both of the plane's engines moved to the "CUTOFF" position almost immediately after takeoff, starving the engines of fuel. It is not yet known if this was done by one of the pilots or happened due to any mechanical faults. While the 15-page report does not provide a full transcript of the pilots' conversation, the authorities shared a snippet indicating confusion in the cockpit. "In the cockpit voice recording, one of the pilots is heard asking the other why did he cutoff. The other pilot responded that he did not do so," AIIB officials said. The report also notes that fuel switches moved to "RUN" seconds later. One of the engines apparently started cycling toward recovery, while the other continued to struggle. This was not enough to maintain flight and the plane crashed after spending less than a minute in the air. Commenting on the preliminary report, aviation expert Sanjay Lazar who has worked with Air India for 37 years, said that the document "raises more questions" than it provides answers. To view this video please enable JavaScript, and consider upgrading to a web browser that supports HTML5 video He also said it was "regrettable" that the full transcript from the cockpit has not been shared with the public. The AAIB-provided note on the pilots' conversation indicates that "either none of them cut it off and it got cut off some other way, or you know, there was some element of subterfuge. So it adds a cloud of mystery over that," he told DW. With the focus of the probe moving onto Boeing's fuel intake controls, Lazar pointed to two directives issued by the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) possibly relating to the issue. The first, non-mandatory directive in 2018 had FAA warning that these fuel switches could have a fault and advising supervisory bodies to check them. The second one in 2022, however, was mandatory — and it focused on engine fire control panel and engine fire control switches. According to Lazar, the FAA said checks were necessary due to reports that foreign object debris "may have been introduced during maintenance or rework" of certain units, with one of the risks associated with it being an "uncommanded activation of the engine fuel shutoff." Air India admitted not following up on the first, non-mandatory directive. It was not immediately clear if the airline took action on the 2022 order. Air India also said its maintenance records for the crashed jet showed that the throttle control module, which includes the fuel switches, was replaced in 2023. However, "the reason for the replacement was not linked to the fuel control switch," the AAIB said in their preliminary report. In recent days, news agencies reported that Boeing was assuring airlines its fuel switch locks were safe. According to a media reports, Air India CEO Campbell Wilson issued an internal memo on Monday acknowledging that the preliminary AAIB report "provided both greater clarity and opened additional questions." "I urge everyone to avoid drawing premature conclusions as the investigation is far from over," he said. To view this video please enable JavaScript, and consider upgrading to a web browser that supports HTML5 video Wilson also said all mandatory maintenance and checks were completed on the Boeing aircraft. "There was no issue with the quality of fuel and no abnormality with the take-off roll. The pilots had passed their mandatory pre-flight breathalyser and there were no observations pertaining to their medical status," he said in the note. On Tuesday, Singapore Airlines said it had completed the inspection of its 787 fleet, including planes used by its low-cost subsidiary Scoot, and confirmed all were functioning properly. Germany's Lufthansa group also said it rechecked fuel switches on its own 787s in the wake of the Air India crash, and found no faults. Indian officials are due to submit their findings regarding fuel switches by next Monday. The final report on the crash, however, is likely to take a full year or longer. To view this video please enable JavaScript, and consider upgrading to a web browser that supports HTML5 video Meanwhile, the Airline Pilots' Association of India (ALPA India) requested to be included as observers to provide "the requisite transparency" in the official probe. "We feel that the investigation is being driven in a direction presuming the guilt of pilots and we strongly object to this line of thought," ALPA India president Sam Thomas said in a statement issued over the weekend. Whatever the outcome of India's and other probes, the latest Boeing crash is likely to further degrade the already shaky reputation of the US airspace giant. Boeing has been struggling to recover from two fatal crashes in 2018 and 2019, both of them involving 737 Max jets. While multiple factors contributed to both tragedies, both of them were linked to the plane's Manoeuvring Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS), which is designed to automatically push the plane's nose down if it detects a danger of stalling. Between the 2019 crash and the latest incident in India, Boeing aircraft were involved in a series of smaller midair emergencies, such as a door ripping off of an Alaska Airlines 737 Max-9 in January 2024, or a 787 suddenly dropping during flight and leaving some 50 people injured in March 2024. Some two months later, one person died when a Boeing 777 hit turbulence while flying from London to Singapore. To view this video please enable JavaScript, and consider upgrading to a web browser that supports HTML5 video Multiple whilstleblowers have also publicly raised concerns about production issues and alleged safety gaps in Boeing's production process, though achieving clarity on the complaints has proven to be difficult. In March 2024, a Boeing former employee who had recently been giving evidence against the company in a whistleblower suit died of what police later said was a self-inflicted gunshot wound. Weeks later, another whistleblower passed away after a short illness, after coming down with a fast-spreading infection and developing pneumonia.
