The National Population Register 2020 wants to know your mother tongue. In 2010, it did not.
The NPR will help the government of India deliver development to India’s poor, or so Union Home Minister Amit Shah has been claiming.
How will knowing the mother tongue of every Indian help Amit Shah deliver the fruits of development? By the way, linguistic data is already collected in the Census. But you see, the Census can only tell you the languages spoken in a village, a tehsil, a block, a city, and maybe a neighbourhood. It doesn’t reveal what languages Ram Kumar speaks, what is his neighbour Abdul Khan’s mother tongue, or that of Abdul’s friend Joseph D’Mello’s.
Also read: Why India should shelve NPR, the National Population Register
The development link
When the Census Act was passed in 1948, the people running India had respect for basic human decencies as privacy. But now, Amit Shah demands to know the mother tongue of every Indian, at the click of a button, on a mobile app.
Development, he says. We don’t know what development projects need the Narendra Modi government to link our mother tongues to our Aadhaar number, driving license number, passport number, voter ID number and who knows what else. Don’t worry, your PAN number is already linked to your Aadhaar, so that’s not needed in NPR.
Is Amit Shah planning to study the demand of MGNREGS work among Telugu-speaking people who don’t vote in elections? Is the Modi government going to give extra money in the PM-Kisan dole to Meitei-speaking farmers who don’t have a passport yet? Is the government going to start mother-tongue courses for linguistic minorities? There’s a Bengali who lives next to my house. He’s the only Bengali in the colony. Is Amit Shah planning to send a Bengali language teacher for the family? Or a Bengali-speaking yoga teacher perhaps?
Also read: Abandon NPR, delink it from Census — 190 economists and social scientists urge Modi govt
The language link
None of this makes sense. Why on earth would Amit Shah need individual level and household level linguistic data for development when he already has village-level linguistic data and his government can still not create jobs or prevent banks from collapsing.
It becomes a little worrying when you recall Amit Shah saying a while back that he wants Hindi to replace English as India’s “link language”. It gets even more worrying if you realise India has no data privacy laws and the one proposed by the government is actually a law to legalise unbridled government surveillance.
It is an insult to the intelligence of the people of India that the government needs to know our mother tongue to deliver development. But if you add the absence of data protection, you begin to see what’s happening.
Also read: More power & data access to govt — all about personal data protection bill
The privacy link
Think of the potential of linguistic data in targeting propaganda. In any case, when the Modi government says development it means propaganda. The NPR also collects phone numbers. You could be a Tamilian living in Haryana, but don’t worry, Mann Ki Baat SMS updates will reach you in Tamil after you’ve signed away your mother tongue to the NPR.
Somehow, the BJP might also come to know you are a Tamilian living in Haryana. You might then be added to a WhatsApp group that will give you an endless stream of Islamophobia and fake news in Tamil.
You might be a Bengali living in Bengaluru. With a few clicks, the government could make a list of all Bengali speakers in Bengaluru and ask them to prove their citizenship with the right documents within 14 working days. After all, Aadhaar and Passport aren’t proof of citizenship, as government officials have already pointed out.
Not many are able to see what a disaster the NPR is. One day, when the linguistic data from NPR might be used for delimitation, the opposition parties will know why they should have opposed NPR more strongly.
And it’s not just linguistic data. There is any number of micro-targeting possibilities in the NPR, helping the BJP in its election game. Using NPR data, they could target people of different profiles differently. And since we have no data protection law, we won’t know how, when and where the data is being misused and our privacy violated.
The author is contributing editor to ThePrint. Views are personal.
Why this nonsensical write up in present social media era from a product probably of JNU?
how much did you get to write this nonsensical comment in the present era from a totally retrograde party that is determined to take us back to the fake-glorious past?
The glorious past is not fake. You are the one suffering with self abhorring colonial babu mindset. This nation commanded 24% of global GDP,was leader in math and astronomy,invented yoga and Ayurveda. Romans had to suspend trade with India because of our comparative advantage. Every self respecting patriot is not a paid troll
There’s a lot if things the government can ask me about myself like-
*Do I have a good house to live in?
*Do I have a proper earning to live a decent lifestyle?
*Do I have a proper source of education?
*Do I have a proper healthcare system?
*Do I have access to good food?
*Do I have a proper plan for my life when I grow old?
*Do I have proper and we’ll maintained roads?
*Do I have proper water supply?
*Do I have affordable electricity?
*Do I have a good public transportation system?
*Do I have safe road system?
*Do I have an efficient and honest police system, judicial system, administration system, public services, civic amenities?
*Do I have clean air to breath and clean water to drink?
*Do I live a happy life?
These are a few examples of what all the government , which I have chosen with my vote , should ask me. These are the kind of questions that the government NEEDS to ask me.
But all the government WANTS to know about me are things that don’t matter at all like my place of birth, my date of birth, my mobile phone number, whether I’m leftist or rightist, how I call on to my God, ,what festival I celebrate, what I do with my free time …. And now the government wants to know what language my mother speaks !!!!
This is stupidity of the purest kind there is. And also I see people fighting to justify this stupidity.
But I’ll take consolation in knowing that there are rational intellectuals still living in my country who, despite of all heaps of garbage like insults hurled at them, keep on bringing some enlightenment to the otherwise blinded public which fails to read between the lines.
Thank you for this lovely article.
Print..is a Media Presstitute sponsored by the Bhrast Nehru-Gandhi Parivar so who cares about what this yellow Media House writes about Mr.Amit Shah..
Oh biased piece of shit. You call this journalism. You shekhar gupta shame on you.
Print is notorious for writing biased articles. This article is also in same tradition. May good sense prevail on you.
Such a pathetic article! Like this author needed to write something maligning against the govt but he couldn’t muster any other crape than this piece of shit. “Tamilians living in Haryana could be added to a WhatsApp groups”, FACE-PALM ??♂️O’ lord, we have such dimwits in our country calling themselves “journalists”.
Nonsense… Utter nonsense….. U try to play games with the public as shekhar gupta tries to gather subscribers in his shows CUT THE CLUTTER & NATIONAL INTEREST so that when they read the news articles written by others of THE PRINT ,they can be misguided.
Enough of this…. You have forgotten that this is the era of social media and now fake and these nonsensical news won’t work ….. Come out of your left mindset and see that now the majority indians have opened their eyes…. Shekhar gupta, shame on you for playing these games with your fellow indians….
Wasn’t mother tongue a parameter to be filled in earlier census questionnaires? It is not a new thing. Why such a brouhaha now? Oppose for the sake of opposing? As they say in Marathi, ” The salt served by the one you don’t like is less salty( than the one served by your beloved!) “
No every opposed idea is WRONG..Only Bhakt Mind & Mentality is Correct & True.
Had your little brain not noticed,his name suggests he is from south India,if his wisdom doesn’t makes him feel threatened by supposed imposition of Hindi as this author implies then why should you be? This government has things to do other than constantly firefighting communal narrative.
Absolutely biased article. Had some respect for your news, that’s gone for sure. The gentleman who has written this is for sure on the payroll of Kongress n wants to drag the country to the same old corrupt n non progressive era. Just ask this Man if he was living in any other country, for example, US, UK or for that matter any moderately developed country, will gw allowed to live without furnishing these basic data. When those countries ask it’s okay but if you try to impose in India, you have a problem. Simple question is if you are so uncomfortable, please relocate to your place of comfort.
Will urge the news channel to be more responsible in putting up these kind of wonky article least you patronage these sentiments
What a shit writing, I can see a single cohesive paragraph, better learn writing instead of journalism, Shivam you are you a per world freelance writer?Just asking, the way you repeated same point multiple time.
AWESOME ARTICLE…THIS TYPE OF ARTICLE’S REALLY NEEDED AS OUR COUNTRY GOING THROUGH HARD TIMES!!
WE CAN SEE MANY VENOMOUS ANDH-BHAKTS ARE BARKING HERE…OH YEAH I HERED THEY BEG SOME 2RS FOR EACH VENOMOUS COMMENT ??. SO POOR BHAKTS. AND WHAT THEY EARNED JOINING 2RS IN yes bank also vanished by their own “boss”…??. ANDH-BHAKT’S OPEN YOUR EYES ATLEAST NOW.
Because of such a data which is available in Gujarat state, the state has provided Orissa medium schools for people who have migrated from Orissa…..
Btw I m Indian living in Bangalore……
One of the waste article… I ever read…. Will stop reading the articles of the print…
It could be understood if ANDH-BHAKTS like you were good at English..??.
Problem is you and your family lived a life of slavery under Scamgress ruling area.. Your only hard earned money was looted by Scamgress to build their houses in UK, Italy n many other countries.
Never mind all those bullshit people who don’t have any identity in India must be kicked out
Are you ashamed to tellyour mother youngs.Is there any difficulty to live togeter the persons belonging to different mother tongues.The content & logic of the article is meaninglesd
You are such a nonsense reporter i have ever seen
Print is a nonsense newspaper. Censors facts that expose BJP. Shame on you Print.
Where is the so called development? Bas ek jumla hai. Even Bhakts like you have jumla patriotism lol.
https://m.businesstoday.in/story/budget-2020-niti-aayog-shocker-poverty-hunger-income-inequality-up-in-22-to-25-states-uts-poor-indians/1/393404.html
Using big words does not make you intelligent Mr. Bhaktard. Not does shouting BJP no jai make you patriotic lol.
Iam not holding any grudge with any of the religious group while writing this article but yes I would like to speak truth. I believe there should be human values at the least although politicians mostly believed to have criminal records… All of the Islamophobia, terrorism is very well planned with media having to work on the ideology of the leaders. You can’t find newspapers to print truth.. First instance world trade center was insured against terrorist attack and it was very organized terror plot by Bush… Aftermath many scientists proved it was controlled demolition of building… Taking the inspiration from US, Modi burnt his own hindu people brutally heading to Gothra to death… I would ask what the sincere practicing hindu people did to Modi.. Not to forget the seat Modi is sitting, is having blood strains of his own hindu people.yet It’s a nice joke Modi talking about nationalism and uniting hindus…Modi planned yet another mass murder this time to kill his own soldiers guarding the country in pulawama… What a height of hypocrisy for hindu nationalism? Hindu nationalist murdering their own soldiers who leave their families to guard nation.. We don’t need any foreign country to attack India but few Modi’s can smartly wipe out Indian military… What if nuclear war erupted it would cost millions of innocent Indian citizens life just to cater Israel needs to avenge their hatred for pakistan..Thanks to PM khan for dealing very diplomatically and avoid war.. It’s not far when military head or any innocent hindus will become scapegoat of Modi’s murder plot… Delhi riots witnessed Modi mobs with arms persecuting unarmed civilians..police didn’t act and inturn helped modi mobs. Imagine a person who don’t have any criminal record in life, a sincere Indian citizen’s mother being raped by hindu mobs, children burned to death and all of his life savings, business is over… What would be his next aim? People will come up with arms openly when police and judiciary sideline. It will impact everybody in society not only hindus, Muslims… Killing will become very common sometimes even without reason…How many times Muslims being persucuted in world and everytime they were small force overcoming the situation.. similar persecution has been witnessed in Arabia where disbelievers torcherced Muslims for practicing truth and struggle for freedom eventually gave victory to Muslims making it a Muslim nation… Eventually Modi’s persecution of Muslims will make India another Muslim nation..
Modi never won peoples vote, EVM machines that were voted by people got systematically changed during transportation with manipulated EVM machines… Modi ordered seperately more than 2 lakh EVM machines to manipulate votes… Today we witness that judiciary , police, election commission, newspaper etc are all corrupt and don’t stand by law making lawless India which is dangerous to every single citizen…
1) All of the Islamophobia, terrorism is very well planned.
Q1.1) Why only muslim community people are used for such planned attacks?
Q1.2) Why leaving 1 to 2 muslims here & there like Arif Mahummad Khan or Subuhi Khan etc condemn those terrorist attacks and side line themselves from those terrorists who have acted at the occasions in India throughout the history after 1947?
Q1.3) What about the exodus of Kashmiri Hindus, minorities in Pakistan & Bangladesh? Why muslims of India don’t have any sympathy/love/humanity with those people?
2) Taking the inspiration from US, Modi burnt his own hindu people brutally heading to Gothra to death.
Q2.1) Do you know that Gothra happened before world trade center being destroyed?
Q2.2) You are the only person who is claiming this. Supreem court gave clear chit to Modi in all cases & remember he didn’t abscond from any hearing or arrest. Ground reality is that people of Gujarat still love him. So the most important question which arises is those people from various NGO’s or media houses like NDTV or print or scroll etc who covered gujrat riots & did media hearing for modi, went to international form are silent about Godhra? Why are they being partial? Is there something fishy?
3) Modi planned yet another mass murder this time to kill his own soldiers guarding the country in pulawama
Q3.1) If you are going to read articles like this (the one about NPR) where people are constantly being fed with fear, false news, propaganda, assumptions etc you are going to give same kind of statements. The organisation whose name refers to the name of sword of Mahummad claimed attack & the police personnel who was involved, was arrested by same government then you are definitely mis guided.
4) What if nuclear war erupted it would cost millions of innocent Indian citizens life just to cater Israel needs to avenge their hatred for pakistan..Thanks to PM khan for dealing very diplomatically and avoid war
Q4.1) Do you know Pakistan’s history of
nuclear proliferation? Mr Q Khan who passed the nuclear technology to north Korea?
Q4.2) it’s pakistan who always threats to India. Not the other way around. Whole world is worried about Pakistan’s nuclear weapons going into wrong hands as everyone know & even pakistan accepted that they have many terrorists in their land
Q4.3) you even know how, when & who takes decision to fire a nuclear weapon in India? PM is the final approving authority but decision isn’t taken only by PM & everything goes on record.
Q4.4) don’t start rumours & fear like this article of NPR.
5) Delhi riots witnessed Modi mobs with arms persecuting unarmed civilians.
Q5.1) first of all this was not a riot in delhi. It was an attack on Hindus. Muslim leader’s involvement from AAP party is clearly coming out. Who got benifits from the election & whose house was used with sling shots mounted on roof walls & rickshaws. This much preparation is called attack not riot.
Q5.2) Not a single photograph or video came out where hindus are involved only people having wearing topy are seen. So you mean to say only hindus have camera in phones & muslims do not? Might be true as muslims were busy in throwing stones, stabbing IB personnel 400 times with knife etc. (Islamic way of butchery)
6) How many times Muslims being persucuted in world and everytime they were small force overcoming the situation.. similar persecution has been witnessed in Arabia where disbelievers torcherced Muslims for practicing truth and struggle for freedom eventually gave victory to Muslims making it a Muslim nation… Eventually Modi’s persecution of Muslims will make India another Muslim nation..
6.1) your intensions about gazwa e hind are now coming out.
7) Modi never won peoples vote
7.1) This is your imagination. The more you protests against CAA, boycott NPR, stand against NRC/uniform civil code/population control act etc the more votes he will get. As these topics are in BJP manifesto from the beginning of the party. They are working as per their commitments & not missing on anything. On top of this constant being true to their words people of india are watching your nude dance on streets. Which will make him PM again in 2024. And most importantly we will have POK aslo merged with India.
What iam mentioning is truth and what you hear is the corrupt politicians voice through news channel.. Mainstream media is sold out whether it be BBC, CNN etc.. US sponsers 50 million dollars on daily basis to carry out terrorist attacks in occupied terroritories like Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and their mainstream media propagates lies…. Iraq has 40 percent of world oil and all money goes to US and even India is stealing from Iraq.. Muslims are only 30 percent in world but 70 percent wealth belongs to Muslims.. The world can’t move even one day without importing from Muslim world…
1.What about the exodus of Kashmiri Hindus, minorities in Pakistan & Bangladesh? Why muslims of India don’t have any sympathy/love/humanity with those people?
1.A Firstly you should understand that kashmir neither want to join Pakistan nor India and it was fighting for independence..Kashmiri pandits supported right wing hindu indian politicians denomination in region leaking intelligence information of kashmiri fighting for its freedom..right wing hindu politicians started persecuting Kashmiris through Indian military and diverted the Kashmiri independence fight to hindu Muslim conflict.. If Kashmiri Muslims persecuted hindu pandits, they would have demolished hindu shrines in kashmir. Both Muslims and hindus died in casualties… Some scholars have also accused the Indian state and Media of utilizing the experience of Hindus as a tool of propaganda. In February 1993, a notable Indian magazine launched an investigation upon a list of 23 shrines provided by Bharatiya Janata Party and found that the claims of alleged desecration of scores of Hindu shrines in Kashmir, widely perpetuated by the Indian media and right-wing Hindu politicians, were “false”… The hindu shrines still exists and hindu pandits were invited many times by Kashmiris to settle down… Not to forget India is ruled by Muslims for 800 years and if they persecuted hindus and demolished hindu shrines, not even one hindu would have remained… Islam doesn’t permit to demolish the hindu shrines and forced conversion.. It is heart to heart connection of truth and one has to turn toward its creator with love(God)…
Taking the inspiration from US, Modi burnt his own hindu people brutally heading to Gothra to death.
Q2.1) Do you know that Gothra happened before world trade center being destroyed?
World trade center is 9/11/2001 and gujrat riots were in 2002…The burning of a train in Godhra on 27 February 2002, which caused the deaths of 58 Hindu pilgrims karsevaks returning from Ayodhya, is cited as having instigated the violence.. US was heavily in debt and was about to default unless they invade and control oil…
It would interesting to have an IQ check on all our politicians of all parties in India, Anyway our unemployed people are just wanting jobs. Modiji and Shahji are playing the proverbial religious fiddle while India’s economy is burning. Gandhiji, Sardar Patelji, Netaji, Bhagat Singhji, and all martyrs and those who gave up everything to see their mother country free if they can see our country now what will they say say? We should remember the historical fact that the majority can be horribly wrong. Satyamewa Jayatu, Truth alone triumphs. Take us Lord from darkness to light and from untruth to truth.
Stupid article. What’s so wrong in declaring your mother tongue. Is it a head going affair? Do not over respond with biased opinions.
My dear spread the hate it is the good fruit of Indian democracy.
It seems these kind of people are useless products of JNU, JMI, AMU and many more.
Rubbish agenda driven low levelled write up.
This is utter rubbish and low level agenda driven writing. Conspiracies abound in your article.You happily give all your personal data when you register for some e-mailing/e-commerce website.You almost bare your self on Facebook and crib so much about citizen’s data inputs for national planning. Come on man grow up man…….unless you do it for some malafide pecuniary benefits, even if goes against the national interest, which, can’t say if you have any.
really biased article against india’s progressive move of the govt..
looks like a paid advt.
I wish you people had belonged to Assam Hindu’s and tasted the flavor the real fruit by bjp that left even poor hindu families struggle. One of such painful story is here for you http://youtu.be/vlMqDuFpe_k
Caution: Do not drink any type of urine before clicking the abv link.
Your one way analysis towards Modi Govt is only rubbish. Conspiracy is your agenda. Seems that The Print, itself became Tadipar and publishing only hatred. Seems that The Print motivate itself thru Mohammaddi Islamic Jihadi Terrorism. You just keep on hailing Mohamaddi terrorism
Most idiotic article by leftist story writer.
How a very ordinary man can explain his difficulty to a doctor or Govt servent.
These are the people who give ideas to rioters to cover their faces. These are the intellectuals who instead of asking the protester to protest with logic and conviction tell them to hide their faces. They will promote the objections to being identified through Aadhar or CC TV footages. It is their gun fodder for wars they have no guts to fight. If the rioters are caught and identified then the identity of the perpetrators and instigators becomes obvious as also the money and Biryani trails.
Sub standard writers they dont how begging learn livhood .sir only 5 %people got independent and enjoying constitution benfite public see 8 time mp now mp chif minster dont have trust own MLA BJP rules 15 year wiout problem this problem you feel
This excessive and damning vigilantism on the part of the government, in the absence of laws protecting data privacy and preventing misuse of personal data, is nothing but gross adventurism. This is totally uncalled for. No wonder, India is crashing at the bourses and shining in the ignominy of the bloodbath on Dalal Street in Bombay and Jafrabaad Road in Delhi.
(Md. Israil)
Why are afraid of giving out our mother tongue & names of parents? Any application ranging from college admission to official documents ask for much more.
Do you really beleive that he should have this information .next will be how many times do you shit in a day and so on.
Isn’t wasting of money and time?
ओवर स्मार्ट रिपोर्टर ,
तुम जैसे चूतिये रिपोर्टर ही देश की जनता को भड़काने की काम करता है , और फिर दंगा करबाते है , और उसीको रिपोर्टिंग करके अपना घर चलाता है , तुमलोग साले कोंग्रेसी दलाल हो इसीलिए सब कुछ तुम्हे गलत ही लगता है ,
Its nothing other than caste implication in Hindus it self for vote politics.