The Committee on Official Language, under Article 344, examines the Official Language Commission's recommendations and reports its opinion to the President.
At a glance
A 30-member parliamentary committee under Article 344(4) that examines the Official Language Commission's recommendations and reports its opinion to the President.
Article 344(4)-(6): Committee composition, its duty to examine Commission recommendations, and the President's power to issue directions based on its report.
It is the parliamentary check through which the Constitution's plan for the progressive use of Hindi and restriction of English is reviewed before the President acts.
The Committee on Official Language is a body of Members of Parliament created under Article 344 of the Constitution to examine the recommendations of the Official Language Commission and give its own opinion to the President before any directions on the use of Hindi and English are issued. It sits at the intersection of Parliament's oversight function and the Constitution's carefully staged plan for the spread of Hindi as the official language of the Union.
Constitutional Basis: Article 344
Article 344 creates two distinct bodies. Under clause (1), the President must, by order, constitute a Commission at the end of five years from the commencement of the Constitution, and again at the end of every ten years thereafter, consisting of a Chairman and members representing the different languages listed in the Eighth Schedule. Under clause (4), separately, "there shall be constituted a Committee consisting of thirty members, of whom twenty shall be members of the House of the People and ten shall be members of the Council of States," elected respectively by the members of the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha in accordance with the system of proportional representation by means of the single transferable vote.
What the Committee on Official Language Does
Clause (5) of Article 344 states that it is the duty of this Committee to examine the recommendations made by the Commission constituted under clause (1) and to report its opinion on them to the President. The Committee's role is thus not to conduct its own independent inquiry into the state of Hindi and English usage, but to scrutinise, from a parliamentary standpoint, the findings and proposals of the Official Language Commission before those proposals can have any binding effect. Clause (6) then gives the President the power, notwithstanding anything in Article 343, to issue directions in accordance with the whole or any part of the Committee's report once it has been considered — meaning the Committee's opinion is a necessary intermediate step through which any change to the official-language regime set out in Article 343 must pass.
The Official Language Commission
The Commission that the Committee examines is itself constituted periodically — first at the five-year mark, then every ten years — and its duty under clause (2) is to make recommendations to the President on: the progressive use of Hindi for the official purposes of the Union; restrictions on the use of English for those purposes; the language to be used for the matters covered by Article 348 (language of the Supreme Court, High Courts, Bills and Acts); the form of numerals to be used for specified Union purposes; and any other language-related matter the President refers to it. Clause (3) requires the Commission, in making these recommendations, to have due regard to the industrial, cultural and scientific advancement of India and to the legitimate claims and interests of people from non-Hindi-speaking areas in relation to public services.
The Wider Constitutional Framework on Language
Article 343 makes Hindi in the Devanagari script the official language of the Union, with the international form of Indian numerals for official purposes, while providing that English would continue to be used for all official purposes for fifteen years from the Constitution's commencement — a transitional period during which the President could also authorise additional use of Hindi and the Devanagari numerals. Parliament was empowered, even after this fifteen-year period, to provide by law for the continued use of English or of the Devanagari form of numerals for specified purposes. It is against this transitional design that the Commission and Committee under Article 344 were meant to operate: periodically reviewing how far Hindi's use could be progressively extended and how far English's role should be curtailed.
Article 345 lets a state legislature adopt, by law, any one or more languages in use in the state, or Hindi, for the state's official purposes, with English continuing until the legislature provides otherwise. Article 346 makes the language authorised for Union official purposes the default language for communication between states and between a state and the Union, though two or more states may agree to use Hindi for communication between themselves. Article 347 allows the President, on a demand being made, to direct that a language spoken by a substantial proportion of a state's population be officially recognised in that state or part of it, if satisfied that such a demand is genuinely and substantially supported.
Eighth Schedule Languages
The Eighth Schedule to the Constitution, whose language representatives populate the Official Language Commission, currently recognises twenty-two languages: Assamese, Bengali, Bodo, Dogri, Gujarati, Hindi, Kannada, Kashmiri, Konkani, Maithili, Malayalam, Manipuri, Marathi, Nepali, Odia, Punjabi, Sanskrit, Santhali, Sindhi, Tamil, Telugu and Urdu.
UPSC Relevance
Prelims
- Article 344(1): Official Language Commission constituted at five years, then every ten years, from the Constitution's commencement.
- Article 344(4): Committee of Parliament on Official Language has 30 members — 20 from the Lok Sabha and 10 from the Rajya Sabha, elected by proportional representation through the single transferable vote.
- Article 344(5): the Committee's duty is to examine the Commission's recommendations and report its opinion to the President.
- The Eighth Schedule currently lists 22 languages.
Mains
- Examine the constitutional mechanism under Article 344 for reviewing the progressive use of Hindi, and assess the respective roles of the Official Language Commission and the parliamentary Committee in that process.
- Discuss how Articles 343 to 347 together balance the promotion of Hindi as the Union's official language with the linguistic diversity of the states.
FAQ
Q1. What is the Committee on Official Language? It is a 30-member parliamentary committee constituted under Article 344(4) — 20 members from the Lok Sabha and 10 from the Rajya Sabha — whose duty is to examine the recommendations of the Official Language Commission and report its opinion to the President.
Q2. How is the Committee different from the Official Language Commission? The Commission, constituted under Article 344(1), is composed of a Chairman and members representing languages in the Eighth Schedule and makes the initial recommendations on Hindi and English usage; the Committee, a body of MPs under Article 344(4), separately examines those recommendations and reports its own opinion to the President.
Q3. How are the Committee's members chosen? They are elected by the members of the House of the People and the Council of States respectively, in accordance with the system of proportional representation by means of the single transferable vote.
Q4. What happens after the Committee submits its report? Under Article 344(6), the President may, after considering the Committee's report, issue directions in accordance with the whole or any part of it, notwithstanding anything in Article 343.
Q5. When is the Official Language Commission constituted? At the expiration of five years from the Constitution's commencement, and thereafter at the expiration of every ten years from that commencement.
Quick Revision
- Article 344(1): Official Language Commission — constituted at 5 years, then every 10 years.
- Article 344(4): Committee of Parliament on Official Language — 30 members (20 Lok Sabha + 10 Rajya Sabha), elected by proportional representation/single transferable vote.
- Article 344(5): Committee examines Commission's recommendations, reports opinion to the President.
- Article 344(6): President may issue directions based on the Committee's report, notwithstanding Article 343.
- Article 343: Hindi (Devanagari script) is the Union's official language; English continued for 15 years from commencement.
- Article 345–347: state official languages, inter-state communication language, and special recognition of a language spoken by a substantial section of a state's population.
- Eighth Schedule: 22 recognised languages.
Sources
- Constitution of India, Article 343 — https://www.indiacode.nic.in/
- Constitution of India, Article 344 — https://www.indiacode.nic.in/
- Constitution of India, Articles 345–347 — https://www.indiacode.nic.in/
- Constitution of India, Eighth Schedule — https://www.indiacode.nic.in/
Further Reference
For deeper reading on this topic and the wider polity syllabus, these standard works are recommended:
- M. Laxmikanth, Indian Polity (McGraw Hill) — the standard UPSC handbook.
- D.D. Basu, Introduction to the Constitution of India (LexisNexis) — authoritative constitutional-law treatment.
- The Constitution of India — Bare Act — the official text.
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Constitutional provisions
Hindi in Devanagari script is the official language of the Union; English continued for 15 years from commencement, extendable by Parliament.
Official Language Commission constituted at 5 years and every 10 years thereafter; recommends on Hindi's progressive use and English's restriction.
Committee of Parliament (30 members: 20 Lok Sabha, 10 Rajya Sabha) examines the Commission's recommendations and reports its opinion; President may issue directions based on this report.
State official languages, inter-state communication language, and special recognition of a language spoken by a substantial section of a state's population.