Article 29 of the Indian Constitution protects the interest of not just religious but also linguistic minorities. It states that any section of the citizens residing in the territory of India or any part thereof having a distinct language, script or culture of its own shall have the right to conserve the same.
Tulu is one of the oldest languages spoken by the people of South Coastal Karnataka and North Coastal Kerala. Census 2011 notes that there are 18,46,427 native speakers of Tulu in India. The cities of Mangaluru, Udupi and Kasaragod are the epicenters of the Tulu language. As Tulu is not one among the official languages in India, speakers of the language have a sense of discontentment and feel that over the next couple of decades, they might lose their identity as Tulu speakers. Hence, many have started raising their voices to include Tulu in the 8th Schedule of the Constitution.
It is said that Sri Madhvacharya, the 13th century spiritual leader and the founder of the Dvaita school of Vedanta was born to a Tulu speaking family. While popular belief/notion is that Tulu language does not have a script, there are inscriptions available that proves the contrary. The oldest available inscriptions in Tulu are from the period between 14th to 15th century AD. Unfortunately most of the Tulu speaking people from Karnataka today, write Tulu in Kannada.
Today, Jai Tulunad’, an organization is at the forefront promoting the language through its online teaching programmes free of cost to people who are interested in learning Tulu in its native script. However, for many years Tulu was taught using Kannada, Hindi or Malayalam scripts depending on the location of people attending the class. Jai Tulunad is now requesting the Governments at the State and Centre level to include Tulu to the 8th schedule of the Constitution.
The Karnataka Tulu Sahitya Academy is an autonomous organization under Government of Karnataka established in 1994. Tulu Sahitya academy organizes workshops, seminars, cultural events and gatherings for Tulu public. It also provides research grants for research in Tulu language and culture, publishes books and presents the annual awards in the fields of Tulu literature, Tulu folk arts, Yakshagana, research and novel writing.
According to the Karnataka Tulu Academy and other Tulu institutions, a total of over 40 lakh Tuluvas are spread over different parts of Karnataka including Bengaluru. More than 1.5 crore people are using Tulu across the globe. On August 28, 2020, a delegation of people’s representatives from coastal Karnataka met chief minister B S Yediyurappa, seeking state official language status for Tulu and handed over a memorandum. BJP state minister Kota Srinivas Poojary, Mangaluru (north) MLA Dr Bharath Shetty, Puttur MLA Sanjeeva Matandoor, MLCs Pratap Simha Nayak and Shantaram Siddi were present on the occasion.
On January 9, 2021, Udupi-Chikmagalur MP Shobha Karandlaje inaugurated the renovated Uchila branch of Mahalakshmi Cooperative Bank Ltd. Karnataka Tulu Sahitya Academy president Dayanand Kathalsar unveiled the Tulu name board of the cooperative bank. This move was appreciated by social media users saying that this is the first bank having Tulu name board.
Historic day for Tulu script. pic.twitter.com/CLKIB2OTLq
— Kiran Kumar S (@KiranKS) January 15, 2021
Udupi Sri Krishna Mutt ( Paryaya – Admaru Mutt) has organised various cultural and religious programmes as part of the fifth centenary celebration of the Paryaya puja system of the Ashta Matas. On January 22, on the Occasion of Saura Madhwa Navami, Tulu script learning session will be inaugurated at Udupi Sri Krishna Mutt. Udupi Krishna Mutt also has a nameboard that has Tulu and Sanskrit.
It would be surprising to know that there is also a Tulu film industry. While it took almost 43 years from 1971, for the first 50 Tulu movies, the next 50 came in just four years. The 100th Tulu movie was released in 2018. There is also a Tulu matrimony site as part of Bharat Matrimony.
It is also to be noted that Prime Minister Modi spoke Tulu during his election campaign at Mangaluru. Few months ago, the hashtag #TuluTo8thSchedule was trending on Twitter where several social media users demanded the official language status for Tulu.
As people from different backgrounds have started promoting the usage of Tulu and learning Tulu scripts, revival of Tulu as a written language is definitely not far away.