Hindi Debate Competition (through Zoom Meeting) was organized at Indian Institute of Soil and Water, Dehradun on 06.09.24 from 3:00 pm to 5:45 pm. The topic of discussion in this competition was - “Separating Hindi dialects from Hindi and recognizing them as independent languages ​​is a danger signal for the Hindi language” (with special reference to the Eighth Schedule of the Indian Constitution and the National Education Policy 2020).

About 30 scientists, officials and staff from various institutes of Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) - Central Institute of Agricultural Engineering (CIAE) Bhopal, Indian Agricultural Statistics Research Institute (IASRI) New Delhi, Indian Agricultural Research Institute (IARI) Center Indore, National Dairy Research Institute (NDRI) Karnal, Indian Vegetable Research Institute (IIVR) Varanasi, Directorate of Medicinal and Aromatic Plant Research (DMAPR) Anand- Gujarat, Indian Sugarcane Research (IISR) Lucknow, National Bureau of Plant Genetic Resources (NBPGR) New Delhi, National Bureau of Agricultural Insect Resources (NBAIR) Bengaluru, Central Rainfed Agricultural Research Institute (CRIDA) Hyderabad and Indian Institute of Soil and Water Headquarters Dehradun and its research centers - Kota, Ooty, Chandigarh participated in this competition.

In the first phase of the competition, the contestants presented their views in favour and against the topic. Thereafter, in the second phase, while conducting the competition, Deputy Director (Official Language) Ashutosh Kumar Tiwari presented some figures and facts related to demography related to the number of speakers of languages ​​included in the Eighth Schedule and “UNESCO Report (Language) 2020” in relation to the pros and cons and asked the contestants to present their arguments in their context. After the contestants presented their arguments, in the final phase, the judges of the competition – Professor Gangadhar Wanode (Regional Director, Central Hindi Institute, Hyderabad Centre, Ministry of Education, Government of India) and Professor Kalicharan Jha (Tripura University) presented concluding remarks in the context of the topic.

In his presidential address, the Director of the Institute, Dr. M. Madhu, while welcoming Professor Gangadhar Wanode and Professor Kalicharan Jha, thanked them for giving their valuable time to this program. On this occasion, he expressed his gratitude to all the scientists, officers and staff who participated in this competition from various institutes of Indian Council of Agricultural Research.

The program was conducted and coordinated by Deputy Director (Official Language) Shri Ashutosh Kumar Tiwari and technical coordination was done by Assistant Chief Technical Officer Er. Amit Chauhan.