'Love your language, don’t hate mine': Kamal Haasan takes dig at ‘imposition’ debate during NDTV Summit

Speaking at NDTV’s Tamil Nadu Summit, the Makkal Needhi Maiam (MNM) chief said language is a matter of personal choice and cultural pride, not coercion.

“Love for anything — father, mother, woman, girlfriend, wife — is a two-way action. Language is my cultural pride and that’s where it stays. To love my language, I don’t have to hate another,” Haasan said when asked whether linguistic pride should become a political ideology.

“If I want someone to love my language, I can love his language. But do not impose it on us. Leave the choice to the people,” he added.

Underlining that language is ultimately a tool of communication, Haasan said it becomes deeply personal when tied to emotion and expression. When pressed on whether language issues are being used to fuel political narratives, he warned against turning love into something “toxic”.

“Love should never become toxic. Be it a marriage of languages, it cannot be toxic and it cannot be imposed. Leave us the choice,” he said.

Haasan’s remarks come amid an ongoing tussle between the Tamil Nadu government and the BJP-led Centre over alleged Hindi imposition.

The DMK government has repeatedly accused the Centre of pushing Hindi, while the state recently introduced a two-language formula under its State Education Policy.

On Sunday, Deputy Chief Minister Udhayanidhi Stalin reiterated that Tamil Nadu would firmly oppose any attempt at Hindi imposition, recalling the language agitations of the late 1930s and the sacrifices made to protect Tamil.

Sharing his own experience, the 71-year-old Haasan said he learnt Hindi by choice at the age of 27 and was never forced to do so. “I didn’t allow anyone to impose it on me,” he said, narrating how curiosity and friendship sparked his interest in the language.

“I can speak Hindi, but I can’t write it at all,” he added, joking that he is “not so literate” in about six languages but considers himself a scholar in three — “Tamil, English and cinema.”

When asked if cinema can be considered a language, Haasan quipped, “Cinema can speak any language — with subtitles, of course,” drawing loud applause.

Referring to the controversy last year over his remark that Kannada was born out of Tamil, Haasan clarified that his comment was misunderstood. “What I said was out of love. I didn’t mean anything else,” he said, adding that politicians — including himself — are often not qualified to speak authoritatively on language history.