Ministry of Human Resource Development to celebrate Matribhasha Diwas

The Matribhasha Diwas which falls on 21st February will be celebrated by HRD Ministry across the country. The Vice President of India, M. Venkaiah Naidu will be the Chief Guest at the main event to be held in New Delhi on 20th February, 2020. Union HRD Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal ‘Nishank’ will be the Guest of Honour on the occasion. MoS, Ministry of Culture and Tourism Prahlad Singh Patel and MoS, HRD Sanjay Dhotre will also grace the occasion. The theme of the programme is ‘Celebrating our Multilingual Heritage’ reflecting the spirit of Ek Bharat Shreshth Bharat.

MHRD along with educational institutions and language institutions is celebrating the Matribhasha Diwas for the past three years. This year also the educational institutions will organize activities like Elocution, Debating, Singing, Essay writing competitions, painting Competitions, Music and dramatic performances, Exhibitions, Online resources and activities as well as events exploring the cognitive, economic, social and cultural activities of multilingual society, Exhibitions depicting linguistic and diverse wealth of India in at least two languages and also more.

International Mother Language Day (IMLD) is a worldwide annual observance forming a part of UNESCO’s calendar of events, held on 21st February to promote awareness of linguistic and cultural diversity and multilingualism. It was first announced by UNESCO on 17th November, 1999. It was formally recognized by the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) in 2008. The latter called upon its member states “to promote the preservation and protection of all languages used by people of the world”.

Our country has unparallel linguistic and cultural diversity and fittingly, it is proposed to observe in India 21st February, 2020 for events that promote our languages and the associated diversity of usage and literature. It has been decided to celebrate Matribhasha Diwas on 21.2.2020 every year, to promote the use of mother tongues and to achieve the following objectives:-

– Highlight the linguistic diversity of our country;

– Encourage usage, not only of the respective mother tongue but other Indian languages as well.

– To understand and draw attention to the diversity of cultures in India and the consequent forums of literature, craft, performing arts, scripts and other forms of creative expression.

– To encourage the learning of languages other than one’s own mother tongue.