Hindi Sabha founded, nurtured by Gandhi carries on his fighting spirit in South India

What Mahatma Gandhi began as a modest class in Tamil Nadu over a century ago to propagate Hindi in south India and unite people across the country, has grown into a mammoth institution, bearing testimony to his legacy of forging ahead against all odds.

The Dakshina Bharat Hindi Prachar Sabha, founded in 1918 in Chennai, then known as Madras, runs 11 PG centres, 33 teacher training institutes, five CBSE schools and a number of prantiya sabhas today. Gandhi had said the Sabha should enable more people to read, write and speak Hindi.

According to published Prachar Sabha archives in Hindi, Gandhi had noted in his convocation address to students in 1946, "I doubt what I am saying, you people are understanding. But you have deep love for me and that's why you are listening very patiently."
"People will not accept forced imposition, but they are happy to learn Hindi voluntarily or for that matter any other language. Globalisation has broken the language barrier," he told PTI. "Opposition to Hindi is a non-issue."