September is observed as Hindi Month in India. Hindi Day was celebrated across the country on September 14, and Hindi Fortnight is being observed from September 15 to 30. Hindi month is more than an occasion to celebrate a language. It is an opportunity to reflect on Hindi’s remarkable journey, its expanding global presence, and, equally importantly, the contribution of those who did not speak Hindi as their mother tongue but devoted their lives to nurturing and enriching it.

On 14 September 1949, the Constituent Assembly adopted Hindi in the Devanagari script as the official language of the Union. Since then, September 14 has been observed as Hindi Diwas. Over the decades, however, Hindi has moved far beyond the boundaries of an official-language debate. It has emerged as a major language of literature, journalism, education, cinema, popular culture and digital communication. It is among the world’s most widely spoken languages and is spoken or understood by communities in more than a hundred countries. The global journey of Hindi also tells a story of linguistic openness. Its development has never been the exclusive achievement of native Hindi speakers.

Scholars, writers, journalists, teachers and intellectuals from Bengal, Maharashtra, the South, the Northeast and even distant countries have made substantial contributions to its growth. Their work reminds us that a language becomes truly universal not by excluding other languages but by creating bridges among them. Interestingly, some of the foundational chapters of modern Hindi were written outside the Hindi-speaking region. The development of Hindi prose received an important impetus at Fort William College in Calcutta. Lallu Lal composed Prem Sagar there in 1810, a work widely regarded as an important milestone in the history of Hindi prose. Calcutta also witnessed another landmark in Hindi’s history when Udant Martand, the first Hindi newspaper, began publication on 30 May 1826.

More than a century later, the University of Calcutta awarded its first M.A. degree in Hindi in 1921 to Nalini Mohan Sanyal. These facts are not merely historical curiosities. They challenge the narrow assumption that Hindi belongs only to the geographical regions where it is traditionally spoken. Its history demonstrates that people from different linguistic backgrounds have repeatedly adopted Hindi as a medium of intellectual and cultural exchange. Bengal, in particular, made an extraordinary contribution to the development of Hindi.

Figures such as Tarini Charan Mitra, Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar, Keshav Chandra Sen, Raja Ram Mohan Roy, Shyam Sundar Sen, Chintamani Ghosh, Sharda Charan Mitra, Amrit Lal........

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