Few days back I read an interesting article in BBC about the Indian union cabinet minister for chemicals & fertilizers Mr. M.K.Azhagiri, who happens to be the son of Tamil Nadu chief minister Mr. M.Karunanidhi. He probably entered Lok Sabha sheerly because of Karunanidhi's influence. He has not spoken a single word in the parliament until now. He spoke couple of sentences in English after the question was submitted to him before hand and he had time to prepare. When there was a follow up question, the speaker of the house Mrs. Meera Kumar intervened and said that the minister of state would take up further questions.
The interesting thing I got to know from that article was that the question in the parliament could be asked in any language (officially recognized Indian language) but could be answered only in Hindi or English. Now, my confusion is, how is it okay for someone to ask the question in any Indian language but it is not proper to answer back in any Indian language. If it is possible to translate a question in English or Hindi then why is it not possible the other way around. I fail to understand.
How is it possible that in sixty three years of independence this was not an issue ? At least, I had not heard about it. We definitely would have had many such ministers in the past who did not speak any other language other than their mother tongue. To my knowledge there is no requirement in our constitution for a central minister to know Hindi or English. Even the article did not mention if there was any such rule. In a country like India I do not think our forefathers would have included such a rule.
