Goodbye to Hello

"Don’t say hello, it’s too western, Indian civil servants told"

by Amrit Dhillon, Delhi, thetimes.co.uk

October 3, 2022

 

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Civil servants have been told to bid goodbye to saying “hello” in the Indian state of Maharashtra, home to Mumbai and an estimated 125 million people.

 

The state government has banned employees from using the word, which it decries as too bland and western. Instead, they must greet the public with the more sonorous “vande mataram” or “I bow to thee, oh motherland” as India presses ahead with the “Hinduisation” of public life.

The state is ruled by the prime minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party, which is asserting the cultural supremacy of the Hindu faith and Indian tradition. The order from the chief minister describes hello as a western greeting that “does not evoke affection”.

 

Maharashtra is the third largest state in India….