Chennai, March 12 Activists of the 'May 17 Movement' intensified their ongoing protest against what they termed as the imposition of Hindi on Thursday, by defacing Hindi letters on signboards at the Chromepet and Nungambakkam railway stations in Chennai.
The protest marked the second day of the outfit's planned direct action, following a similar demonstration at the Chennai Park railway station on March 11, which coincided with the death anniversary of the 1938 anti-Hindi language martyr, Thalamuthu.
According to a press release issued by the organization's coordinator and founder, Thirumurugan Gandhi, the movement had officially declared its opposition to linguistic centralism on February 2 to mark International Mother Language Day.
The group expressed its strong condemnation of the Union government's policy of prioritizing Hindi in entrance examinations for federal services, including the Railways, the banking sector, the income tax department, and NLC.
The movement alleged that conducting recruitment exams primarily in Hindi and English creates an inherent disadvantage for youth from non-Hindi-speaking states like Tamil Nadu, who are unable to write exams in their mother tongue.
The activists claimed that this policy has led to a situation where a majority of personnel working in Union government institutions within Tamil Nadu hail from Hindi-speaking regions, while local candidates are effectively sidelined from employment opportunities.
The protestors further stated that their campaign of erasing Hindi lettering from public infrastructure is a response to the perceived imposition of the language upon Tamil Nadu students and the marginalization of local languages in the professional sphere.
Following the incidents at the suburban stations, security has been tightened across major railway hubs in the city to prevent further defacement of public property.