By : Satyaki Paul
On June 13, 2021 there was a massive twitter trend for making Tulu as official language under Eighth Schedule of the Constitution. The Tulu twitter campaign was flooded with hashtags such as: #TuluOfficialinKA_KL, #TuluTo8thSchedule, etc.
Tulu is a Dravidian language mainly used in two coastal districts of Dakshina Kannada and Udupi of Karnataka and Kasaragod district of Kerala. According to the 2011 Census report, there are around 18.4 lacs Tulu-speaking people in India. To gain from steams from such massive followings, a political party called “Tuluvere Paksha”was formed. In due course, this party even received recognition from the Election Commission of India (ECI) in February 2021 under section 29A of Representation of the People Act 1951.This recognition has given wings to the political ambitions of the Tulu-speaking people for a separate state which would be known as “Tulu Nadu”.
Apart from such controversies, Tulu itself has a rich oral literature tradition with folk-song forms such as “Paddana”, and traditional folk theatre “Yakshagana”. Tulu also has alively tradition of cinema with around 5 to 7 Tulu language movies produced every year. Tulu films are being exhibited every day in regions of Mangaluru and Udupi, Karnataka.Furthermore, some scholars suggested that Tulu is among the earliest Dravidian languages with a history of 200 years. Robert Caldwell in his work “A Comparative Grammar of the Dravidian or South-Indian Family of Languages” (1856), observed Tulu as “one of the most vastly developed languages of the Dravidian family”.
The move to include Tulu language in the Eighth Schedule of the Indian Constitution is also supported by some BJP state legislators. The Kannada film actors are also rooting for success for this twitter movement. The movement is significant. However, carving out a separate just on the linguistic basis will further divide our country in more silos, thus the inherent “unity in diversity” concept will slowly dissolve in due course of time which should not be the case. The author works as a Ph.D. Research Scholar at the Department of Anthropology, University of Calcutta, and the co-author of the book Anthropology For All (2021).