Lessons in Punjabi for south Indian doctors begin at PGI

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, January 28

The PGIMER has introduced coaching of its resident doctors (represented by 40 per cent south Indians) to overcome the five-decade-long language barrier between patients from Punjab and the doctors.

While resident doctors at the PGIMER are the ones who interact the most with patients, both in the Out Patient Department (OPD), wards and emergency the lacking proficiency of the south Indian doctors even in Hindi has been resulting into wastage of crucial consultation hours. A language teacher was recently appointed for the doctors to help them at least follow the Punjabi accent of patients initially and gradually learn both Punjabi and Hindi. The classes were introduced a week ago. Interestingly, the teacher, Pandit Rao, is also a South Indian. Hailing from Karnataka, he also faced a similar problem when he was appointed as a sociology teacher in Chandigarh a decade ago. Not only did he learn Punjabi, but has also been promoting the language among others like him. He has requested the PGI not to pay him anything but allow him to teach for one hour. The resident doctors, meanwhile, shared the challenges they had been facing in speaking even Hindi in the correct accent. Punith Kumar, a senior resident doctor in the Department of Medicine, has been facing the challenge for the past four years.

“We mostly find patients coming into the PGI from rural Punjab. Sometimes, we find it impossible to convey our point to them despite repeating the sentences several times. It hurts when we are not even able to convey sympathetic words to ailing patients as they do not understand our south-Indian Hindi accent,” he said.

Pandit Rao is posted as assistant Professor, faculty, in the Sociology Department, Postgraduate Government College (PGGC), Sector 46.

He also released a book titled ‘Sat Sri Akal Doctor Saheb’ recently, carrying conversations between doctors and patients translated from English to Punjabi. At present, there were a total of 1,500 resident doctors at the PGI. Of these, nearly 40 per cent were from southern India. Patients from rural parts of Punjab constitute at least 45 pc of the footfall at the hospital, said sources.