Amrita Pritam

Dost-mittar #40 I think Punjabi will survive in India. Specifically because of Sikhs. It is their religion`s language. Based on my experience Indian Punjabi speakers, specifically Sikhs, are far more interested in Punjabi than anyone in Pakistan. The non-Sikhs may be interested in it, from India, because they are a small group, trying to protect a language......

In Pakistan, 66% of the population speaks Punjabi or Sariaki. However, I have a feeling the language is on a steep decline. The only thing keeping it alive is the low literacy rate..........

- Punjabi in Pakistan has no economic value. So no one, including all Punjabis, wants their children to pursue it educationally. Punjabis want their kids studying English or Urdu......

- Punjabi has lost its social status. It is now considered the language of the illierate or poor. If you see Pakistani dramas, all the poor people or servants are shown speaking Punjabi. The rich Punjabis speak English in public, the middle class speaks Urdu. And those who cannot speak either, speak Punjabi..........The rich and middle class only speak Punjabi inside their homes.......if that

- Punjabi has no academic base in Pakistan. No one gets a degree in it. It is not taught in any school at any level. And there are hardly any universities that teach it........One can barely find a dictionary......

- Urdu is now spoken from one end of Pakistan to the other. The educated first generation of Punjabi-speakers, after paritition (my parent`s generation) spoke Punjabi as their first language. The educated second generation of Punjabi-speakers (my generation) speaks Urdu as their first language, and Punjabi as their second or third language. The generation after this may not even know Punjabi. My nieces and nephews don`t know it..........

The moment the literacy rate goes above, say 80%, everyone in Pakistan Punjab will be speaking Urdu. I would say another 50 years or so, and Punjabi, which is not a written langauge in Pakistan any more, will not be a spoken language either..........

Having said that, it has made a small revival of sorts, in literature. Very small. It is cool to speak some Punjabi and dress like a Punjabi landlord at weddings. And it has made a big revival in music, with even Pathan and Urdu-speaking singers singing in Punjabi regularly. And Punjabi film industry is the largest in Pakistan...........However, I don`t think that will last, once everyone is literate and learns Ghalib and Mir in school...........And has no clue who Bulleh Shah and Amrita Pritam are/were...........

echoboom #41: Thanks......Where did you find this..............

The wording seems correct......There are minor differences...........Galee`on in the Urdu text implies streets..........

Sain Dilliwale: we understand..you were having waDDA ``O`` while writing this post.:)

Holy Macro guys,
I apologise for posting this multiple times, my Laptop was slow in responding(or perhaps the chowk`s server).

I think part of the problem is that Urdu letters don`t translate one-to-one to Gurumukhi script.
Tenth line from the bottom in Urdu ``Gulliyon`` written in Urdu with Gaaf/Leem/Yyal/Wow.
In Gurumukhi, same would be written with Gugga+Lulla+Yyya+a small O Matra.

Urdu word can be double meaning whereas Gurumukhi would be straight forward for this particular word. This also explains why my father`s generation say Punjabi words like Pakistanis do, there is no distinction between Chota ``O`` and Wadda ````OW``, sihari, lihari etc.

If I were to write this word in Urdu I would use the ``OW`` sound as produced by ALif and the postscript of ``~`` rhymes with Office.

Anyways, Umar Sahib you did great job attempting this task of translation.

Echoboom: There are people on our side who seriously believe in uniting the Punjabis by bridging the Language gap, while respecting each others soverignity. There are people in Punjab and Delhi(like me) who can read both the scripts to understand each other better.

Re: # 41
I think part of the problem is that Urdu letters don`t translate one-to-one to Gurumukhi script.
Tenth line from the bottom in Urdu ``Galliyon`` written in Urdu with Gaaf+Leem+Yyal+Wow.
In Gurumukhi, same would be written with Gugga+Lulla+Yyya+a small `O` Matra.

Urdu word can be double meaning whereas Gurumukhi would be straight forward for this particular word. This also explains why my father`s generation say Punjabi words like Pakistanis do, there is no distinction between Chota ``O`` and Wadda ````OW``, sihari, lihari etc.

If I were to write this word in Urdu I would use the ``OW`` sound as produced by ALif and the postscript of ``~`` rhymes with Office.

Anyways, Umar Sahib you did great job attempting this task of translation.

Echoboom: There are people on our side who seriously believe in uniting the Punjabis by bridging the Language gap, while respecting each others soverignity. There are people in Punjab and Delhi(like me) who can read both the scripts to understand each other better.

Re: # 41
I think part of the problem is that Urdu letters don`t translate one-to-one to Gurumukhi script.
Tenth line from the bottom in Urdu ``Galliyon`` written in Urdu with Gaaf+Leem+Yyal+Wow.
In Gurumukhi, same would be written with Gugga+Lulla+Yyya+a small `O` Matra.

Urdu word can be double meaning whereas Gurumukhi would be straight forward for this particular word. This also explains why my father`s generation say Punjabi words like Pakistanis do, there is no distinction between Chota ``O`` and Wadda ````OW``, sihari, lihari etc.

If I were to write this word in Urdu I would use the ``OW`` sound as produced by ALif and the postscript of ``~`` rhymes with Office.

Anyways, Umar Sahib you did great job attempting this task of translation.

Echoboom: There are people on our side who seriously believe in uniting the Punjabis by bridging the Language gap, while respecting each others soverignity. There are people in Punjab and Delhi(like me) who can read both the scripts to understand each other better.

Re: # 41
I think part of the problem is that Urdu letters don`t translate one-to-one to Gurumukhi script.
Tenth line from the bottom in Urdu ``Galliyon`` written in Urdu with Gaaf+Leem+Yyal+Wow.
In Gurumukhi, same would be written with Gugga+Lulla+Yyya+a small `O` Matra.

Urdu word can be double meaning whereas Gurumukhi would be straight forward for this particular word. This also explains why my father`s generation say Punjabi words like Pakistanis do, there is no distinction between Chota ``O`` and Wadda ````OW``, sihari, lihari etc.

If I were to write this word in Urdu I would use the ``OW`` sound as produced by ALif and the postscript of ``~`` rhymes with Office.

Anyways, Umar Sahib you did great job attempting this task of translation.

Echoboom: There are people on our side who seriously believe in uniting the Punjabis by bridging the Language gap, while respecting each others soverignity. There are people in Punjab and Delhi(like me) who can read both the scripts to understand each other better.

Umair:
I am still not sure, if this urdu-script one is a repeat from the gurmukhi one which was originaly
a repeat from shahmukhi one. Roman Urdu, Panjabi htchet-jobs notwithstanding.

Anyway this template is here to do further reasearch on this.

[ I must emphasise that even some of our most `respected` scholars are themselves pretty sloppy & careless--for most of them literature-study is a paid-job and a stepping stone in their public-relationing enterprise]

dullabhatti:
Thanks. I had read it attributed (wrongly, I suppose) to Amrita.

drlokraj:

I think that the father of Punjabi Ghazal was Parkash Saathi. His ghazal, ``JadoN meri arthi uttha ke chalan gay`` was beautiful sung by Asa Singh Mastana.

Romair:

Punjabi language will live and prosper, at least in Indian Punjab, because people they are quite devoted to it. All languages are dynamic and evolve: no one today will understand Chaucer`s English or even many words in Shakespeare`s plays.

drlokraj/kaurasach: thanks for the info.......

I went through ten to fifteen discussions of this sort, before doing the final translation. Poetry is too deep and one keeps discovering things. Some of the meaning is deliberately lost in the translation, because one has to keep the balance of the poem..........Although I try to keep as close as I can, to the specific translation of the word and the meaning of the verses (quite difficult to do).........

1. DardmandaaN da dardi is not narrator but one who feels their pain

This is correct. A deliberate change of meaning from my side. An accurate translation would be, ``Some who feels the pain of the pained.``

2. bela is jungle/forest and not fields

Didn`t know that. I thought it was field.......

3. trinjan is not play ground--it is a common place where girls used to spin cotton their charkhas.While spinning,they would usually singe folk songs as well,to which Amrita has referred as ``galeon tuttay geet``

Yes this is correct. I translated it as playgroup. Not play ground. A playgroup of young girlfriends......In Punjabi poetry, trinjan is refered to as the first thing that breaks, due to some sort of tragedy.....This is primarily due to family feuds etc.....A trinjan of young girls is used to depict innocence and love, and its breaking is used as an indication of the appearance of feuds, class differences, etc. Marriage is also considered a cause of breaking a trinjan, since marriage for women in Punjabi soceity is also considered a tragedy or sorts (as depcited by various marriage Punjabi songs, and the crying of the girl and her mother as she leaves the house)...........

4. LagaaN keelay lok-munH bus phir dung hi dung

This can have multiple meanings. Of which the one you have written was my original choice. Then I changed it. Again having the original Urdu text would help, since it is difficult to translate from Roman Punjabi......

5. Sane sej de berian.... in this stanza, Luddan who was Heer`s naakhuda,has thrown away the boat along with the famous bed of heer which was always in that boat and

I searched for the translation for Luddan for three weeks. Including posting it on Chowk. No one could give any meaning that fit. Finally, I found logs. Which would imply that the bed and the boat, both made from logs, were, themselves, caste away by the logs that created them........That kind of fits..........However, Luddan, as the name of Heer`s naakhuda seems to fits perfectly.......This is probably why I could never find a fitting meaning of Luddan as a punjabi word......

``the peepal tree itself breaks the swing along with its own branches.``

This is very insightful. It took me a long time to figure out this theme......The same theme applies to, ``trakleon tutti tand,`` as well as ``Luddan dittian rohr``

Surjeet Patar is definitely good but after Amrita-Mohan-Shiv,Paash is probably the best poet of punjabi.
Surjeet Patar`s best ghazal is ``kuchh kihaa taaN hanhera jarega kiweiN
Chupp rihaa taa shamadaan kee kehn gay``
and his best poem is ``laggi nazar punjab nu,ehdi nazar utaaro``
latter can be listened to at www.apnaorg.com in his own voice along with 4 other poems/ghazals.

Re: # 34
Why would it be communal if I refer to it as Sikh?
It can be a Sikh Poem and shared by everyone, that is how I see it.

Waris and Bullay shah were Muslim but I enjoy them as Sikh.
That`s all!

I wish we all lived in an Ideal world where we all shared universal mankind as one.
But reality makes it such.

dullahbhatti

Thanks. I have heard about Shiv Kumar Batalvi. He cut quite a striking figure of the doomed romantic poet didnt he?

Thanks for the translation again.

#24,
You are taking it off a very different tangent now by considering Geet as Geeti(small pebbles).

Charkha is almost dead in India but still some woman around Chandigarh area villages are into Charkha spinning and Phulkari.

delhiwala

Why should it be called Sikh poetry? Isnt it poetry for people of all religions of Punjabi background and non Punjabis like me who want to appreciate it?

I think poetry and art should not be communalised like that.