This was conveyed in a letter to State Chief Minister Ashok Chavan by federal Minister of State for Home Ajay Maken on Friday. According to the contents of the letter, Marathi would be used in a thee-tier language formula that includes Hindi and English besides Marathi. According to the letter, orders have been issued to all federal offices in the state to use Marathi. Apart from banks and income tax, all quasi-governmental organizations will now have signboards, forms and public information in Marathi, including application forms, money orders, letters, documents and nameplates.
As per the directives of the federal government, all federal government offices — which also include banks, income tax, central excise, customs and railways — will now have to treat Marathi as the first language in communiqué, forms, signboards and notice boards.
A resolution was passed unanimously in the Maharashtra Legislative Assembly during the budget session in March. Way back in March 1968, the federal government had issued orders to all its offices that postal money orders and application forms be printed in local languages in all states except in Hindi-speaking states. In spite of this, federal-run government offices were not using Marathi. This caused uproar in the assembly and in the budget session both the assembly and the council members passed a resolution that Marathi should be made compulsory in all federal government offices in the state.
In the first week of June, Chavan wrote to federal Home Minister P. Chidambaram pointing out that the federal government offices in the state were not adhering to the order passed in 1968 and referred to the resolution passed by both the houses of the legislature and forwarded to the federal Home Ministry.
Chavan complained to Chidambaram that the three-language formula was being ignored and not implemented in the state in letter and spirit and referred to the issue being raised by the Sena-BJP alliance in the assembly and council alleging that Marathi was not being used as the third language in the state’s federal offices.
