Tap digital market for Hindi language, says Modi

Prime Minister emphasises need to borrow words from various other Indian languages so that Hindi could be enriched

Sounding an alarm that the Hindi language will be seeded to subject of Archaeology if timely action is not been taken to increase its usage, Prime Minister Narendra Modi today urged the new generation to come forward and explore the available market of the Hindi language created in the modern digitised era.

Addressing the 10th World Hindi Conference here, the Prime Minister recalled his earlier days as a tea vendor in Gujarat and said that even though Hindi was not his mother tongue, the routine business of tea-vending helped him learn Hindi well.

He pointed out that nation should recognise that all Hindi promotion movements had been launched by non-Hindi speakers or those whose mother-tongue was not Hindi.

Fast digitisation, social websites and modern devices had created opportunities for new generations to explore the huge "Bazaar" (Market) available for the nation's language, Modi said.

Modi said when some plants and animals are on the verge of extinction, people spend millions to save them, a similar situation had arrived in the case of Hindi language. "If action is not been taken in time, Hindi would be a subject matter of archaeological experts."

He emphasized that there was a not only a need to make efforts for promotion of Hindi but also to extract words from various other Indian languages so that Hindi could be enriched. "Why can't be a workshop on Hind-Bangla for the purpose?" the PM said at the conference that will be concluded on Satruday.

Incidentally, actor Amitabh Bachhan will address the audience on Saturday.