Language is complicated.Language access in a multilingual society is even more complicated...
In India, Hindi is the national language. But there are 22 official Indian languages and hundreds of dialects. There is also a significant emphasis now on reading, speaking, and having interactions in English. As a result, it is not uncommon to meet Indians who speak more than one language or even a couple of languages for that matter.
One's command of language can vary significantly. For example, a lot of children here attend 'English-medium' schools but in reality do not possess enough fluency to socially interact in English because they only speak in their native language at home. It is a little puzzling sometimes to see my neices review their notes for an exam in perfect English and yet refuse to speak to me in English. But I realize that's because we all have the language that we think, feel and react within, and only some people have that capacity in more than one language. (They also can't understand my American accent or terminology which swallows consonants and inadvertently relies on slang and foreign idioms.)
In the U.S., there is little compliance with our civil rights laws on language access even in areas where there isn't significant linguistic diversity. In India, the challenge is overwhelming, especially as middle and upper class people continue to adopt English but the majority of the poor people speak in any number of languages which are not English.
In 2005, the Right to Information Act was passed to provide transparency on government spending and hold government officials accountable. When the Indian Parliament passed this Bill, it was the result of a 15 year struggle against bureacratic corruption. Now the Act has been used in cities and villages to secure basic things like payment of wages and public infrastructure.
But last month the Vice President of India, Hamid Ansari, expressed concern that the Act is not available in the 22 official languages and that the website is only available in 11 languages so far. In the link below, the part I like best is where Mr. Ansari says that empowerment is meaningless if it is sought to be achieved through a language the citizens can't understand.
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