Punjabi needs a new lease of life
AMID the controversy over the alleged omission of the Punjabi language as a subject in the CBSE’s draft policy, I witnessed a scene that made me feel like the odd man out at home. We were watching TV — me, my wife, our son, daughter and grandchildren. A classic Punjabi folk song by Surinder Kaur and Parkash Kaur, “Bajre da sitta vey asaan tali te maroreya…”, was being played. Amazingly, except me, no one in the family knew the meaning of bajra (millet), sitta (kernel), tali (palm of the hand) and maroreya (twisted). It was painful to realise that Punjabi words were fading into oblivion and hardly any effort was being made to save them from a tragic fate.
I recalled the times of Dr MS Randhawa, who had passionately promoted Punjabi during his tenure as the Chief Commissioner of Chandigarh in the 1960s. At times, he would refuse to entertain Punjabi visitors who tried to impress him by communicating in English. Indeed, he was a true Punjabi.
In 1989, I attended the International Graduate Summer School in Librarianship at the University of Wales (UK). One of the delegates, Dr M Ali, was from Tanzania. I asked him, “I don’t know why, but I can smell Indian blood in you.” The prompt answer was, “My family has its roots in Gujarat. More than 200 years ago, my great-grandfather migrated to Africa. I have never visited India; nor has my father.”
Ali’s wife joined him about a month later. At the dinner table, I was amazed to see her in Indian attire and conversing fluently with her husband in Gujarati. Here was a couple that had never been to Gujarat yet kept their love for their mother tongue alive.
The librarianship course featured delegates from 40 countries. Evenings were reserved for chit-chat. Once, a delegates spotted a pet dog and said, “Come, Tommy, come”. The dog belonged to our hostel warden, who immediately arrived and shouted, “Gentleman, my dog understands only Welsh. Please don’t spoil his language by speaking English.” His love for his native language bowled us over.
Members of many communities love their language and literature, be it Bengalis, Gujaratis or residents of southern states. I remember the era when members of virtually every Punjabi family conversed only in Punjabi. As joint families made way for nuclear families, the majority of them started preferring English-medium schools for their children. Thus began an unfortunate trend in which Punjabi took a back seat during conversations in homes. Sadly, the situation has only worsened. Nobody knows how to stop or reverse this process.
