Manmohan Singh Ko Ghussa Aata Hai Kya?

``This is in the news, even if it might be hard to believe! And it is gratifying to read a letter in yesterday`s paper by a Muslim who did mention that bowing to the motherland does not go against the religion and Indian Muslims are accustomed to the names of Hindu goddesses``

I still think this is not the correct way of putting it- for temporal reasons we all ``bow down`` to local clerks, big babus, big stars, big money, our ambitions and other icons of temporal power . In that sense we commit idolatory thousands of times a day. However, ``bowing down to motherland`` is just an expression of our re-affirmation of our temporal roots in the country of our birth. A true muslim only bows down spiritually before one God!!

#47 by halur on September 1, 2004 9:42am PT
omar,

can you not criticize a writer`s work, without attacking the author ?

Vir sapit qui pauca loquitur

well interesting that you say that hullar baz -- that`s an art i learned actually on chowk interacting with the paki-bashing brigade and trying to now emulate their wondrous ways--
have i now close to succeeded ?? have i ???

veeresh is becoming incoherent and one now needs to keep arms length from him

re:#50 by rajsinghi1
``Staying with the languages, :) I recall reading couple of years ago in Atlantic magazine or something like that, that Hindi is now the second most spoken language in the world. Number one is Chinese (Mandarin ?) . English is at third place. ``
I think English is second most spoken language followed by Hindi.
Anyway, numbers do not impress me.
We all know few in this day and age speak that most perfect of all languages: sanskrit. And, if there is merit only in numbers, then as Rajeev Srinivasan remarked in one of his columns, we must all be praising garbage as good for it attracts a million flies!
Methinks every language is great and this controvery as to which is greater is unnecessary.
Sridhar

In my previous post somehow name of the actress got omitted...

It was Tabussam, who came up with those lines ...

Some may remember her from a tv programme called, ``Phool khillay hain gulshan gulshan``

I hope, I myself remember the name of the programme correctly...:)

re:#50 by rajsinghi1
You are right!
It is in the Constituent Assembly and not in the parliament that the matter was debated. Was it also voted there? One would assume so.
The following para from an article in sulkekha.com says it was constituent assembly:
http://www.sulekha.com/expressions/column.asp?cid=99549
Excerpt:
``When the Constituent Assembly gathered in September 1949 to debate the resolution on the national language of India there was a lot of concern. The Hindi as national language proponents claimed that Hindi was understood by 140 million people out of the 330 million people in India at that time and so should be made the official working language of the country. The moderates felt that if Hindi became the official language it could lead to the break-up of the nation. They wanted English to be continued as the official language till an acceptable version of Hindi could be evolved. The Congress Party had committed to the idea of Hindi as the national language at its 1924 CWC meeting. Incidentally, the CWC had approved two scripts for Hindi – Devanagari and Urdu (So much for what India was all about -- cater to the Hindi-wallahs and cater to the Muslims!). Good old Gandhi had plonked for a via media, Hindustani, the combination of Hindi and Urdu, as the national language. But since Urdu had become the national language of Pakistan by 1949, the rather Sanskritized Hindi became India`s national language....``
Sridhar

Farzana Versey

Post#35

So long you are happy, content with the said (#35) post, ........ is fine.


Quote:

``Be well.``

I do reciprocate the sentiments expressed.

HP

Post #39

I sincerely do thank you for the kind words.

Itefaaqan (matter of chance), last evening happened to have watched a filler/ad of Carry on Shekhar`s programme and in those few seconds, Indian actress of yesteryears says two lines which I think, could be appropriate here..:)

It is something like this..

Mere baar-e mein koi rai ka-yam na karna
kyoon-ki, kal mera waqt badla
tau tumahari rai bhee badal jaaigee.

Crude translation:

About me, don`t form an opinion
For, when/if my time (read fate/luck) will change
So will your opinion ...
.
.

Adaab!



And my thanks to you, do stand.

:)

re:#36 by rahulmal
Here is a question for you: how many North Indians in the North can speak or understand even one south Indian language?
I bet the number is miniscule compared to South Indians able to speak/understand Hindi.
If you really want to be fair, North Indians need to try and educate themselves about some of the nuances of the South Indian languages. All that i find even 50 years after independence is the same old Madraasi character in a hindi movie speaking with an accent. I think it is time u guys grew up and learnt some new tricks.
Sridhar

RSridhar

Post#34

Quote:

`` What i wanted to say was that the vote for hindi as a national language was won by a single majority vote. The crucial vote was cast by a muslim MP. This was soon after Independence when parliament debated the issue and put it to vote. ``

Two things. And I could be wrong on both, so please correct me, if that turns out to be the case.

It is possible that my memory could be playing tricks with me.:) for, what I recall reading is quite different from what has been stated above. Inspite of all the problems in accepting Hindi as National or Official language for 15 years, for starters, it was a near unanimous vote. Only one or two members voted against and rest of the members voted for it.

Second, since Constitution accepts Hindi as a national or official or administrative language of India, that would mean that debates on this would have taken place in Constitutent Assembly and not Parliament. But then, as I said at the outset, I could be wrong.

Yesterday, I was trying to find out more on this subject by reading debates, and amendments in the Constituent Assmebly but have not found the debates and/or amendments on the Articles dealing with the languages in general or especially on Hindi.

For information only, I was going through Dr Ambedkar site and the material that I saw there is limited to Articles 200 something whereas languages are dealt in Article 315 or something like that. Will try to check more on this later, if I can.

However, I did find an interesting thing there. Constitution of India was to be made/written in three languages. English, Hindi, and HINDUSTANI. There is very clear reference to Constitution being made/written in Hindustani too (reference is in the form of some member wanting the word ``Rashtrapati`` to be included for President of India, in the English version of the draft Constitution. To this, Dr Ambedkar responded with that this term has not been used even in the Hindi and Hindustani versions. He had copies of both. Of course, that was at that time.). But, as it turns out to be, Constitution is in English and Hindi. Don`t know in what circumstances, and when Hindustani language got dropped. Guess, answer might be in language debates.

Staying with the languages, :) I recall reading couple of years ago in Atlantic magazine or something like that, that Hindi is now the second most spoken language in the world. Number one is Chinese (Mandarin ?) . English is at third place.

re:#36 by rahulmal

(rsridhar,

With all due respect...I can understand a poor Tamil labourer fed on the anti-Hindi dose of Dravidian politics agitating against the introduction of Hindi. But, I fail to understand what educated and professionally successful people like you have against the language. I can bet my last paisa on this that you speak some Hindi (even though you have a distinctly South Indian name) and have benefited in some form or the other with the extra language in your linguistic armour (even if benefit is limited to not getting duped by cunning shopkeepers in CP).

Let`s all learn as many languages as we can, knowledge is a good thing. )

Did i ever say that i was against Hindi?
You have just 80 interactions in Chowk against my more than 2500 and already you are speculating!
Let me tell u a little about myself. I have lived all my life in Delhi, and am a third generation Tamilian from Delhi. I now live in USA for the past 12 years and more.
So, draw your own conclusions about my Hindi-speaking abilities.
I was only stating the facts.
It is a fact that Hindi was not an automatically the most popular choice for a national language soon after independence.
It is a fact that Hindi continues to be popular among the masses in India though it would never replace other national languages. I hope all the national languages coexist peacefully.

I certainly benefitted a lot by living in the North all my life. I have a wider perspective of life, now that i live in the West!
Anyway, please do not jump to conclusions. In this day and age, nobody talks about imposition of Hindi. That matter is dead as dead meat. I suspect even DMK supremo`s wife (or shall i say one of his wives) is learning Hindi somewhere incognito.
Sridhar

omar,

can you not criticize a writer`s work, without attacking the author ?

Vir sapit qui pauca loquitur

omar/45 - while your comments on syynntaxx and grrammarr and spellinngg are no doubt valuable, and your references to FV being whatever she is debate-able, may I, humbly, and without bringing in the Pakistani automobile and road industry, request you for further inputs on the actresses crying at border theory and reportage which you profered, never mind my spellings and lack thereof of syntax grammar and the whole Wren & Martin, please?

FV/44 - see what being tongue in cheek got me?

#39 by HP on August 31, 2004 10:36am PT
31 by rajsinghi1

Raj Sahib,
You are dealing with a person who deems chowk her personal fiefdom. Omar, on the board commented about the quality of work seen above. This piece would not have made it to any respectable magazine and most likely even the worst rags would have refused it. But the Goddess owns this site and we, the mere mortal have no right to question that.



hahaha quite well put HP -- her interaction with kkkandk and her saying that she was interacting him only because of something that he had said sort of implied that it was indeed a great privilege for the barrister sahib to be interacting with her in the first place --

once i read ms versey write somewhere that she was ``happy to report`` that pakistani artistes have much to share with india or some similar kind of material -- i dont have a problem with what the artistes who met her told her but i was wondering the use of the phrase `to report that...` -- now this is something i wouldnt say on a board but perhaps to my editor or something like that -- she also made some rather ill-informed remarks once about the pakistani press but i didnt see it fit to respond to her drivel by my observations on the indian press (which i dont think would be as reactionary as hers) -- but yes i got the sense too that much of what she prints would be refused publication elsewhere except perhaps in TFT (where she is of late being published) but then again their standards are not exactly all that uniform when it comes to publishing feature material -- i can understand someone like the late edward said putting on such airs but even someone like him never did that (i was a student of his at university) -- i suppose that is something too much to expect of someone who insists on wearing their pretended intellectualism on their sleeve

I don`t know what Balbir Punj means by saluting...in my piece, as in all pix of the event, the PM bowed down folding his hands in a namaste to greet the Sonia Gandhis` grandson.

kaurasach:

Nah, I am not looking for anything...going by recent `events` here, I was being tongue-in-cheek. Was playing on the term ``researched``. Btw, did you post that post anywhere? I`d like to see it...

//...It showed the Prime Minister of India saluting — not coddling — the three-year-old latest member of the Nehru-Gandhi clan, on the dais. ...//

Damn!! Did this really happen? Dr Singh saluted the infant??

Boy - if that`s true I don`t know what to say.

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