On Thursday, Canadian Member of Parliament of Indian origin Chandra Arya won many hearts by speaking in his mother tongue Kannada inside the Canadian Parliament.
Chandra Arya, who was re-elected to the Parliament in the 2019 federal election, shared a video of him speaking in his mother tongue Kannada on Twitter.
“I spoke in my mother tongue (first language), Kannada in the Canadian Parliament. This beautiful language has a long history and is spoken by about 50 million people. This is the first time Kannada is spoken in any parliament in the world outside of India,” tweeted Chandra Arya.
Speaking in the Parliament, Arya expressed his happiness to be able to speak in his mother tongue Kannada. He called it a proud moment for the five crore Kannadigas living in Canada.
The Indian-origin MP ended his speech with a poem written by Kuvempu, which is sung by Dr Rajkumar – “Elladaru iru enthadaru iru endendigu nee Kannadavaagiru“, meaning, “Wherever you are, However you are, be a Kannadiga forever.
Chandra Arya, who originally hails from the Tumakuru district in Karnataka, represents the electoral district of Nepean in the House of Commons. He holds a bachelor’s degree in engineering from Ramanagara and a master’s degree in Business Administration from Dharwad in Karnataka. Chandra Arya was elected to the Canadian Parliament for the first time in 2015 and again in 2019 for the second time.
The video has gone viral on social media platforms. Karnataka higher education minister Dr CN Ashwathnarayan shared the video and congratulated Chandra Arya for speaking in Kannada in the Canadian Parliament.