The Ministry of Information and Broadcasting on Friday said it has advised all private satellite TV channels to display credits and titles of Hindi and regional language serials in the languages they are broadcast as well.
“Today we are issuing an order to all TV channels that whatever the serials they broadcast or whatever the programmes they conduct at the end or beginning titles are given and many times the titles are in English,” Javadekar said. “To promote Indian languages, we have asked channels to give those titles in the language in which the broadcast is made.”
Javadekar said channels are free to add titles in English also. “So, we are not restricting anything, we are adding the Indian languages,” he said. “We are issuing such orders for cinema also.”
The ministry said it had noticed that several Hindi and regional language channels display the cast, credits and titles of serials only in English. “This practise tends to deprive people versed with Hindi and regional languages of the valuable information about casting of TV serials or programmes,” it said.
The ministry said the move will “enhance outreach and benefit TV viewers of the country”.
The ministry’s move comes amid a debate on the imposition of Hindi. The Southern Railway on Friday withdrew a circular which instructed station staff and train operation controllers to avoid using regional languages for official communications and instead use only English and Hindi. The railway zone withdrew the circular following protests by the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam in Chennai.
Earlier this month, the draft National Education Policy caused a controversy when a panel of experts initially recommended that students in non-Hindi speaking states learn a regional language, Hindi and English, while students in Hindi-speaking states learn Hindi, English and a modern Indian language from other parts of the country. Following protests by political leaders mainly in South India, the Centre on June 3 tweaked the draft education policy and now does not state which languages students must study in middle school.
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