Himachal Pradesh Governor Shiv Pratap Shukla’s suggestion that Devanagari be adopted as a common script for all Indian languages is not just impractical but also a threat to India’s linguistic and cultural diversity. His remarks, made at a seminar on Tulsidas’ ‘Ramacharitamanas’, missed a crucial point: the beauty of Indian literature lies in its multilingual richness not in forced uniformity. Tulsidas’ work itself is a testament to the power of translation and adaptation. Originally written in Awadhi, it gained pan-India popularity through Hindi, just as Valmiki’s ‘Ramayana’ found new life in Tamil, Malayalam, and other languages. Each version is unique, shaped by its linguistic and cultural context. To claim superiority of one over another—as some do by........

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