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The other day I was reduced to tears (metaphorical) when I read this news item:
http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2014-02-13/india/47304356_1_p-chidambaram-finance-ministry-oxford-english
Suddenly our Boston Brahmin woke up and told our Bada Babu off that he just can't make sense of what the Babu was saying (since it was not said in a Harvard Accent). And asked him to stop talking in his cow-belt-English and revert to his mother tongue which happens to be Hindi. And added that his own minion sitting by his side would then translate his cow-belt-Hindi into the chaste English that a Bostonian like him could follow.
Our Bada Babu then felt humiliated...naturally...even you and I would have, were we in a similar position. And he complained to his neta in writing and asked his complaint to be forwarded to the neta of netas. Of course the complaint would have found its resting place in the bin.
There are 3 distinct aspects of this humiliation:
1. That cow-belt-English is no good for our Boston Brahmin even though our Babu had been speaking it for over 35 years and rose to the secretarial eminence that he did.
2. That our Babu better speak in his mother tongue since he perhaps never went to a convent school but only KV, if that.
3. That the Boston Brahmin doesn't care to understand his Hindi even though it is our prime official language, but needs an interpreter to turn it back into Harvard English:
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The other day I was reduced to tears (metaphorical) when I read this news item:
http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2014-02-13/india/47304356_1_p-chidambaram-finance-ministry-oxford-english
It is about a Bada Babu (BB, about to retire in six months) in our hallowed North Block in Lutyens Delhi being reduced to tears (real, saline) by our Boston Brahmin (BB) neta.
Apparently our Bada Babu was giving a presentation in English (of a sort) in an inter-ministerial meeting seeking funds whose purse strings are pulled by our Boston Brahmin like in a puppet show.
Suddenly our Boston Brahmin woke up and told our Bada Babu off that he just can't make sense of what the Babu was saying (since it was not said in a Harvard Accent). And asked him to stop talking in his cow-belt-English and revert to his mother tongue which happens to be Hindi. And added that his own minion sitting by his side would then translate his cow-belt-Hindi into the chaste English that a Bostonian like him could follow.
Our Bada Babu then felt humiliated...naturally...even you and I would have, were we in a similar position. And he complained to his neta in writing and asked his complaint to be forwarded to the neta of netas. Of course the complaint would have found its resting place in the bin.
There are 3 distinct aspects of this humiliation:
1. That cow-belt-English is no good for our Boston Brahmin even though our Babu had been speaking it for over 35 years and rose to the secretarial eminence that he did.
2. That our Babu better speak in his mother tongue since he perhaps never went to a convent school but only KV, if that.
3. That the Boston Brahmin doesn't care to understand his Hindi even though it is our prime official language, but needs an interpreter to turn it back into Harvard English:
...India has no national language. [8] This was affirmed by
the Gujarat
High Court
in 2010.[9] Article 343 of the Constitution of India specifies that the
official language of India is Hindi in Devanagari script, with English as an additional
language for official work. Article 345 states that a state of India may
officially adopt one or more languages in use in the state
or English as the language or languages to be used for all or any of the
official purposes of that state.[10] There are 22
official languages in India. Assamese, Bengali, Bodo, Dogri, Gujarati, Kannada, Kashmiri, Konkani, Maithili, Malayalam, Manipuri, Marathi, Nepali, Oriya, Punjabi, Sanskrit, Santali, Sindhi, Tamil, Telugu, Tulu, Urdu...
I see that the number of official languages has doubled since my youth when we saw them on our ten-rupee notes.
I never heard a foreign language spoken by foreigners...even English by Englishmen, to my shame. Except one...Russian spoken by a Russian woman teacher. But I heard many an Indian language spoken by folks who speak it as their mother tongue. And was always charmed though I could not make out a single word of it.
My friend, the Late Prof RSS, hails from a village near Aligarh. And he used to speak chaste Hindi which I learned by simply listening to him. His 80-year-old mom was living with his family and I often used to visit their home and occasionally she used to speak to me in her Hindi. And I loved it. But I complained to RSS that I couldn't follow a word of what she said. And had to guess. He then told me that his mom speaks in a dialect of Hindi called Brij Bhasha (if I recall correctly).
So, what Hindi does our Boston Brahmin know, and can speak if cornered? Here are a few of the dialects of Hindi (apart from Urdu and its sisters) that I could find in wiki:
Hindustani, Kanauji, Awadhi, Chattishgarhi, Bageli, Marwari, Mewari, Malwai, Lambadi, Harauti, Godwari, Bagri, Bhojpuri, Magdhi, Sadri, Garhwali, Kumaoni, Pahari, Kangri, Mauritian Hindi, Sarnami, Fiji Hindi, Trinidad Hindi, SouthAfrican Hindi...
These are only the tip of the iceberg...those spoken by two million or more...
I love them all...;)
I won't indulge in enumerating the dialects of my mother tongue, Telugu...you will be stunned...
I think we should celebrate our diversity instead of craving for Harvard English with a chip on our shoulders.
Last year, in the first Parent-Teacher Meeting which my son Sonoo and his wife Sailaja attended with trepidation when Ishani was just in her Nursery Class, they returned happily enough (and got me a bouquet for my English).
But then on they suddenly started speaking to little Ishani in English instead of our lovable mother tongue. I was mystified and asked them what happened and was told that Ishani's convent teacher, a pucca Bengali Bhadramahila, had asked them to speak to Ishani at home only in English.
I revolted against this dictum and speak to Ishani strictly in our colloquial Telugu.
Here is a compliant from Pakistan:
...But there is a large enough number of parents who wish to see the schools prioritise English language literacy above any other language. They do not care if their children get bad grades in Urdu, as long as they get good grades in English.
I have myself witnessed such parents snatch away Urdu-language storybooks, which their children had themselves chosen to read, and thrust English-language storybooks into their hands....
And I have seen the devastated and incomprehensible look on the faces of children too young to understand what had just happened...
...Musharraf Ali Farooqi
Unfortunately, there is not a single Telugu-language storybook in Ishani's bookshelf now.
My fond nostalgia is for my childhood storybooks called the Telugu Chanda Mama series. I just loved them and often quote those stories from memory in my blogs after 60 odd years.
Father, who taught me impeccable English, never spoke to me in that language...never...
I never spoke to my son in English...never.
But both of us have been making our living speaking (and writing) English...I at IIT KGP, and he across America, in real space as well as the video-conferencing one.
The other day, my son told me that he was giving a presentation to bigwigs of his American Bosses who descended on Hyderabad to see with their own eyes how their employees here were performing (...also to buy fake pearls at hundreds of dollars in the Charminar Market).
After his presentation was through, his Big Boss (a tough old lady) apparently asked her neighbor in the audience:
"How many years did this guy spend working in the US?"
"ZERO"
Father, who taught me impeccable English, never spoke to me in that language...never...
I never spoke to my son in English...never.
But both of us have been making our living speaking (and writing) English...I at IIT KGP, and he across America, in real space as well as the video-conferencing one.
The other day, my son told me that he was giving a presentation to bigwigs of his American Bosses who descended on Hyderabad to see with their own eyes how their employees here were performing (...also to buy fake pearls at hundreds of dollars in the Charminar Market).
After his presentation was through, his Big Boss (a tough old lady) apparently asked her neighbor in the audience:
"How many years did this guy spend working in the US?"
"ZERO"
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1 comment:
I am sure our Tamil Harvard Brahmin, FM-PC, has no problem when his Punjabi Oxfordian PM-MMS saya "sport" for "support" and "isport" for "sport" !! Typical bootlicking, eh !
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