January 10, 2021, marks the 15th World Hindi Day as celebrated in India and internationally. This tradition was started by former Prime Minister of the country Dr. Manmohan Singh back in 2006. It is celebrated across the globe to mark the importance and fascinating history of the language of Hindi. It is one of the two official languages of India and is also the fourth most-spoken first language in the world after Mandarin, Spanish and English.
History and Significance:
The World Hindi Day or Vishwa Hindi Diwas is observed on January 10 every year. On this day in 1975, India’s former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi inaugurated the first World Hindi Conference. The conference was attended by Mauritius Prime Minister Seewoosagur Ramgoolam as the chief guest along with 122 delegates from 30 countries.
Ever since then, the World Hindi Conference has been organised in different countries like India, Mauritius, United Kingdom, Trinidad and Tobago, and the United States of America. Meanwhile, it is to be noted that the first World Hindi Day was observed on January 10 in 2006 by former Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh.
How is World Hindi Day 2021 different from National Hindi Diwas?
Both National Hindi Diwas and World Hindi Day are different from each other and have different significance. While World Hindi Day is observed to mark the first Hindi Conference, National Hindi Divas is observed to commemorate the day when the constituent assembly adopted Hindi, written in Devanagari script, as the official language of the Union. World Hindi Day is celebrated on January 10, while the National Hindi Diwas is celebrated on September 14 every year.
Hindi Diwas is celebrated on the same day as the birth anniversary of Beohar Rajendra Simha, he was the man who got Hindi global recognition. Hindi Diwas celebrates the language and writers who use it, while World Hindi Day propagates Hindi on an international level.
Interesting Facts about Hindi:
- Hindi is the official Language of India.
- Fourth most spoken language in the world is Hindi.
- Hindi is a descendant of Sanskrit.
- The first book believed to be published in Hindi was Prem Sagar. The book was published by Lalloo Lal and depicted tales of Krishna.
- The word Hindi originated from the Persian word Hind, which means the land of the Indus river.
- Hindi is the first language of around 430 million people around the world.
- Apart from India, the language is also spoken in Nepal, Guyana, Trinidad and Tobago, Suriname, Fiji and Mauritius. Hindi and Nepalese share the same script – Devanagari.
- The gender aspects of Hindi are very strict. All nouns in Hindi possess genders and the adjectives and verbs change according to gender.
- Many English words have been derived from Hindi, such as chutney, loot, bungalow, guru, jungle, karma, yoga, thug, avatar and so on.
- In linguistic terms, Hindi belongs to the Indo-Iranian sub-family of the Indo-European family of language.
- Hindi has been influenced and enriched by Turkish, Arabic, Persian, English and Dravidian (ancient South India) languages.
- The earliest form of Hindi was called ‘Apabhramsa’, which was an offspring of Sanskrit. In 400 AD, poet Kalidas wrote Vikramorvashiyam in Apabhramsa.
- Hindi is one of the seven Indian languages that can be used to make web URLs.
How do we celebrate World Hindi Day?
The day is celebrated by organizing events by Non-residential Indians and Persons of Indian Origin. The ultimate aim of celebration is to spread the greatness of Hindi language.
Host Cities of World Hindi Conference
| S No | YEAR | HOST CITY | COUNTRY |
| 1 | 1975 | Nagpur | India |
| 2 | 1976 | Port Louis | Mauritius |
| 3 | 1983 | New Delhi | India |
| 4 | 1993 | Port Louis | Mauritius |
| 5 | 1996 | Port of Spain | Trinidad and Tobago |
| 6 | 1999 | London | United Kingdom |
| 7 | 2003 | Paramaribo | Suriname |
| 8 | 2007 | New York City | United States |
| 9 | 2012 | Johannesburg | South Africa |
| 10 | 2015 | Bhopal | India |
Indian embassies abroad organize special events on the occasion of World Hindi Day. Programs in Hindi on various subjects are organized in all government offices.
Nowadays, Hindi is taught in hundreds of universities of the world and millions of people speak Hindi all over the world. Not only this, Hindi is one of the most widely spoken languages worldwide.
In the year 2017, for the first time in the Oxford dictionary, Hindi words like ‘good’, ‘big day’, ‘child’ and ‘Surya Namaskar’ were included.
According to the calculation of World Economic Forum, Hindi is one of the ten powerful languages of the world.
