Language row takes a new turn as Tamil Nadu parties drag Sundar Pichai's name into it

Pichai's name was dragged into debate by TN minister P T R Palanivel Thiagarajan when he sought to know whether not knowing Hindi came in the way of the Google CEO’s successful career

Chennai: Google CEO Sundar Pichai has been dragged into the controversy over the three-language formula by political parties in Tamil Nadu who are now engaged in an intense debate whether the top business executive learnt Hindi during his schooling here. 

Pichai is a native of Tamil Nadu and did his schooling at Jawahar Vidyalaya and Vana Vani Matriculation Higher Secondary School within the premises of the Indian Institute of Technology Madras (IIT-M) before he did his engineering in IIT, Kharagpur.

The opponents of the three-language policy being mooted as part of the National Education Policy 2020 have been buttressing their point by referring to numerous engineers and professionals from Tamil Nadu, who learnt only English and Tamil in schools, making it big in their respective professions. 

Pichai, who is proficient in his mother tongue Tamil, was pushed into the raging debate by Tamil Nadu Information Technology Minister P T R Palanivel Thiagarajan on Wednesday when he sought to know whether not knowing Hindi came in the way of the Google CEO’s successful career. 

“It (three-language formula) is a failure model and there is no need to replace it with a successful two-language formula. Alphabet, Google’s parent company, CEO Sundar Pichai says he doesn’t know Hindi. Did not knowing Hindi hurt him in his career?” he asked. 

Armed with an undated video of Pichai in which the business executive says he learnt Hindi in his school, BJP leaders and supporters pounced on the DMK minister with a twist that private schools even in the 1980s did follow the three-language formula. 

Some BJP handles also posted a video of Pichai speaking in Hindi but Tamil fact-checking website, YouTurn, called it “doctored.”

“I am from the South, and I come from Chennai. I learnt Hindi in school and I never spoke it much,” he said. While Sundar, in the video, merely said he learnt Hindi, the BJP handles, including that of state chief K Annamalai, said the Google CEO did learn Hindi as a third language in school. 

Jawahar Vidyalaya, where Pichai studied, taught students in matriculation syllabus before it shifted to adopting CBSE syllabus in the late 1990s. Pichai completed his schooling in the 1980s. Many users felt Pichai was honest enough to admit that he couldn't speak despite learning the language in school and used this to argue that learning a language doesn't mean one will become proficient in it. 

Annamalai, in his X post, said Sundar Pichai studied three languages in his school, including Hindi, contrary to PTR’s claim. BJP state secretary S G Suryah too claimed Pichai himself says he learnt Hindi as a third language in school. 

“The moot point here is not Hindi but P T R Thiagarajan’s lie that Google CEO studied in a 2-language school. Mind you when Sundar Pichai studied at his school in Chennai it was under TN Matric syllabus & not CBSE Board. This proves even before the boom of CBSE Schools in Tamil Nadu. Private Matric schools had 3rd language policies implemented,” he said.