Corporate professionals and activists from Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, West Bengal and Rajasthan are echoing the sentiment and rooting for rejecting the celebration.

Bengaluru: The central government’s plan to celebrate Hindi Diwas on September 14 is creating a big controversy in the state and other non-Hindi speaking states across the country. What started as a small pro-regional language movement has now become a topic of hot discussion.

Twitter and Facebook are abuzz with discussions whether to celebrate the day or not. The movement started by the Bengalureans Keelara Nage Gowdru, activists Pallvi Idur and Arun Javagal has struck a chord with people from other such states.

Corporate professionals and activists from Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, West Bengal and Rajasthan are echoing the sentiment and rooting for rejecting the celebration. Hot discussion are on at #wedon’twanthindidiwas, #wewantBharathaBhashaDivasa and #stophindiimposition.

Kannada Ranadheera Pade has already announced that Hindi Diwas will be observed as a Black Day in the state. A protest rally against the celebration will be taken out from Town Hall to Freedom Park. They have appealed to all likeminded people to join the protest.

Literary heavyweights, like Prof S.G. Siddaramaiah, president, Kannada Development Authority, and national film award winner Girish Kasaravalli have extended support to the protest.

Tweets: Shruthi H.M., a corporate professional, tweeted, “We are the only country where services are not provided in our language but spend our tax money on celebrating a language that is not ours. If this is not assault on our native languages, what else is?”

JumboBongoSomproday tweeted, “Mugli Hindi is also a regional language. There can never be a national language. All languages are regional and all languages are national. We don’t want Hindi.”

Mallikarjun B., another Twitter user, says with sarcasm, “When we resist Hindi imposition, we are regional separatists!! When they impose and support its imposition on non-Hindi lands, they are nationalists!

Large-scale Hindi imposition sponsored by GOI from many decades has these kind of effects on Hindians.”