Roman "Hindustani"?
UVR
script is not a recent phenomenon, but I didn't know it was this old:
http://www.jnu.ac.in/JNUTA/balraj_sahni.htm
sushi...@yahoo.com
> I knew that the writing of Urdu/Hindi (or Hindustani) in the Roman
> script is not a recent phenomenon, but I didn't know it was this old:http://www.jnu.ac.in/JNUTA/balraj_sahni.htm
UVR sahib,
adaab.
The idea of using roman alphabet for Hidustani/Urdu, appears to be far
older than that.
Please see "Roman-Urdu Journal" from 1878 at the following link:
http://tinyurl.com/7m38v9
And, please see the following link for a reference (from 1822) to Dr.
Gilchrist's use of roman alphabet in his 'method of instruction' for
Hindustani and Persian.
http://tinyurl.com/9ubaos
Thanks for the pointer to the convocation address by Balraj Sahni. It
sure made an interesting reading. Personally I am no supporter of the
idea of using roman alphabet for Urdu or Hindi (or any other schemes
of abandoning their respective traditional scripts), and to me its
futility is made amply clear by the fact that it has not gathered any
popular support despite several attempts over last two centuries.
Regards,
Sushil
Jamil
> On Jan 7, 8:46 am, UVR <u...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> > I knew that the writing of Urdu/Hindi (or Hindustani) in the Roman
> > script is not a recent phenomenon, but I didn't know it was this old:http://www.jnu.ac.in/JNUTA/balraj_sahni.htm
>
> UVR sahib,
>
> adaab.
>
> The idea of using roman alphabet for Hidustani/Urdu, appears to be far
> older than that.
>
> Please see "Roman-Urdu Journal" from 1878 at the following link:http://tinyurl.com/7m38v9
>
> And, please see the following link for a reference (from 1822) to Dr.
> Gilchrist's use of roman alphabet in his 'method of instruction' for
>
> Thanks for the pointer to the convocation address by Balraj Sahni. It
> sure made an interesting reading. Personally I am no supporter of the
> idea of using roman alphabet for Urdu or Hindi (or any other schemes
> of abandoning their respective traditional scripts), and to me its
> futility is made amply clear by the fact that it has not gathered any
> popular support despite several attempts over last two centuries.
>
> Regards,
> Sushil
Balraj Sahni's speech makes fascinating reading, and its contents are
as relevant today as when they were first articulated.
The Hindustani/Urdu/Hindi topic is as interesting as it is emotive.
Scholars have written on it and debated the topic. The following,
however, is a collection of some non-scholarly, very ordinary, random
observations related to the subject.
In the days before satellite TV, Urdu speakers in Pakistan who had
seen Indian films only in cinemas were in for a surprise when they
would eventually learn that the movies that they always thought were
in Urdu, were actually Hindi films. My own reaction was that if the
lines:
na to kaarvaaN ki talaash hai na to hamsafar ki talaash hai
mere shauq-e-Khaana Kharaab ko teri rahguzar ki talaash hai
were in Hindi, then either Hindi is another name for Urdu, or is a
more Persianized form of Urdu. Of course listening to Hindi news on
All India Radio laid that idea to rest.
A few months ago a Hindi-speaking colleague and friend broke the news
to me of the Pakistani president's resignation speech, which the
friend had seen on an Indian TV channel. I was curious to find out
if the speech was in Urdu or in English, because our leaders choose
the language according to what their real intended audience is. So I
asked him if the speech was in Urdu. "No", he said, "it was in Hindi
with some Urdu mixed in."
An Urdu-speaking friend relates that when he first went to a US
university in the 60's, he was invited by some Indian students to go a
Hindi film being screened on campus. The friend replied that he would
go if the film had English sub-titles, otherwise there would be no
point, since he would not understand the movie. He was told that the
film had subtitles, but in any case if he did not understand any part
of the film, they would gladly explain it to him. After the film
ended, it was HE who was explaining the meanings of words like
kashmakash, dilnavaazi, Ghalat andaaz, ajnabi. The film, as the old-
timers may have guessed, was gumraah.
I try to observe when talking to my Hindi-speaking friends as to how
many days will pass with our usual conversation before a word came up
which the other party was not familiar with. The last time it was a
full 3 months before I was floored by a word that sounded like
nischit.
Jamil
Afzal A. Khan
Jamil Saheb,
I had been thinking of contributing to this thread for a few days,
but felt discouraged due to a paucity of new threads/topics/posts.
Even our worthy friend Naseer Saheb has been fighting illness.
I am sure all ALUPers woud join me in wishing him a quick and
complete recovery. He has been one participant about whom it
could be said :
Be~KHatar kood paRa aatish-e-Namrood men 'ishq
'Ishq = 'Ishq-e-Urdu
To put in a nutshell, these factors sort of discouraged me. But
your post has made this brief rejoinder possible. It does not
cover all the matters that I had wished to write about. But, for
the time being, this will have to do.
As folks are aware, including our Pakistani friends, it is
customary for the Indian Prime Minister to address the nation from
the ramparts of the Delhi Red Fort each year on the 15th August,
which is India's Independence Day.
On 15th August 1963, while waiting for Pandit Nehru's speech to
begin, it suddenly occurred to me to sit down near the radio with
a pen and paper and note down those Urdu words that he might use
in his speech. Very soon, one foolscap size paper was finished.
Hurriedly, I picked up another paper. Soon that too was over.
Then I gave up. I must have written down some 220 to 250 words.
Of course, some people can opine (like the friends of your old
friend who saw "Gumrah" together) that the late Pandit-ji was in
fact speaking Hindi ! Your friend would have been in his element
if they had seen the 'hindi' film "MuGhal-e-Aazam" !!
Little did I realize that it was the last speech Pandit Nehru
was making from the Red Fort. He died in May 1964.
More later.
Afzal
Srinage...@gmail.com
Some years ago, I found a collection of Ghalib's ghazals published on
the occasion of his centenary. The most interesting feature of the
book is a foreword by our late President, Dr. Zakir Hussain. Here is
the opening paragraph of his introduction, transliterated from the
Nagri original.
aaj hum Mirza Ghalib ke vafaat ki sau saalaa barsi manaa rahe hain aur
duniyaa ke bahut se mulk is mubaarik tehzeebee kaam mein hamaare saath
shareek hain. maaloom hota hai ki jaise sab muntazir the ki yeh vaqt
aayegaa to jo kucch ho sakta ho karen aur unke mansoobon me khaloos ki
aik shaan nazar aati hai jis se bahut kam shaayaron ko navaaza jaata
jai. main ummeed karta hoon ki ab Ghalib ka kalaam hi nahin balke
unke shakhsiyat ka jo mukaam hamaari taarikh aur tahzeeb mein hai vo
numaayaa ho jaayega aur numaayaa rehagaa.
Dr. Zakir Huaain goes on to cite several couplets and excerpts from
letters in his discussion. I will present a few excerpts in this
post.
main bani aadam ko musalmaan ya hindu ya nasraani azeez rakhta huN aur
apna bhaai ginta huN. doosra maane ya na maane.
nahin kucch subh-o zunnaar ke phande mein giraaii
vafaadaari mein shaikh-o barhaman ki aazmaaish hai
kaabe mein jaa raha to na do taanaa kya kaheN
bhoola hun haq sohbat ahl-e kanisht ko
jaam har zarra hai sarshaar tamanna mujh se
kiska dil hoon ki do aalam mein lagaayaa hai mujhe
urooz-e na umeedi chashm-e zakhm-e charkh kya jaane
bahaar-e bekhizaan az aah be-taaseer hai paida
And one Persian sher, transliterated from the Nagri script and
therefore even more error-filled than the others:
aagashtaa-e aim har sar-e khaar-e bakhuun-e dil
kaanoon baghbaanii sahra navishta aim
I'll try to include his comments on Ghalib in another post.
Regards,
Nagesh
PremC...@gmail.com
> On Jan 7, 8:46 am, UVR <u...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> > I knew that the writing of Urdu/Hindi (or Hindustani) in the Roman
> > script is not a recent phenomenon, but I didn't know it was this old:http://www.jnu.ac.in/JNUTA/balraj_sahni.htm
>
> UVR sahib,
>
> adaab.
>
> The idea of using roman alphabet for Hidustani/Urdu, appears to be far
> older than that.
>
> Please see "Roman-Urdu Journal" from 1878 at the following link:http://tinyurl.com/7m38v9
>
> And, please see the following link for a reference (from 1822) to Dr.
> Gilchrist's use of roman alphabet in his 'method of instruction' for
>
> Thanks for the pointer to the convocation address by Balraj Sahni. It
> sure made an interesting reading. Personally I am no supporter of the
> idea of using roman alphabet for Urdu or Hindi (or any other schemes
> of abandoning their respective traditional scripts), and to me its
> futility is made amply clear by the fact that it has not gathered any
> popular support despite several attempts over last two centuries.
>
> Regards,
> Sushil
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Dosto,
To my mind, discussions of about "what is Hindi , what is Urdu" are
really, Academic for linguists, Drawing room chitchat with a touch of
innocent Indo Pak politics. Its a subject in which almost all
residents of Hindustan (pre 1947) can participate and feel good. You
may disagree with that.
However, we can agree that, we all love a language made up of Persian,
Hindi, Arabic, English, Pushtu etc. Can we simple call it Hindustani
like the British did, and deal with the issue of script. What should
be the script of Hindustani.
Let me get a bit personal. My education started in an English
Catholic school. It taught Urdu as a second language from grade 3.
My father started me with Urdu at home the same time I was learning my
ABC in school., When I got to 3rd grade in 1948, second language in
school became Hindi. So I started learning elementary Hindi in
school. At home I continued with Urdu. My Urdu education stopped when
my father died in 1953. My Hindi education stopped in 1954 when I
passed Senior Cambridge with Elementary Hindi. So I know Hindi and
Urdu at 3/4 th grade level. Can’t type either Urdu or Hindi.
My love for Urdu started early. My father use to read to us from his
Urdu books both prose and poetry. I remember two words from his
poetry bok we loved. One poetry ended with the word "RotiyaaN" and
the other ended with "Burhaapa" .
Only recently from ALUP I found out that the poet was Naseer
Akbarabadi. Im now looking for Naseer Akbarabadis Kalaam in ROMAN or
or Big fonts Urdu Nastaleeq or Hindi. (help)
So now the problem is Script. I have to read Urdu poetry either in
Hindi script or Roman, or large Nastaleeq font in Urdu. I always need
an Urdu- English, and Hindi-English dictionary. For writing its
strictly Roman, and I make up my own spelling as I go along.
So that brings me to the main reason for this post. Is there an
accepted Roman script for Hindustani ?
Where can I get the details. ? do you people find the Roman used by
RMIM adequate ? Can I have the rules for RMIM Roman?
In the following reference by Sushil
There are a few articles in Roman which are very readable and
fascinating. I find them fascinating because I can read good urdu so
easily. I will now look for more articles like that because I am very
interested in life, culture and conditons during Moghul and later
British Hindustan. So Thank you Sushil for that reference.
Now back to my question. What are the rules of that Roman? I will
try to find them my self, but any help will be appreciated.
Sincerely
PJ
Afzal A. Khan
My dear Joshi Saheb,
Thank you for sharing some personal details with us. This is
an earnest of your honest and sincere approach to these
matters.
First of all, it is not quite correct to believe that the Urdu -
hindi question dates from, say, 1947. These differences exist
right from the mid-1800s. The intensity of feelings would, no
doubt, fluctuate from time to time. Things did come to a head
during the 1930s and 1940s.
Now, I am a practitioner of Urdu, but I am not (and have never
claimed to be) a linguist or someone who has delved very deeply
in these controversial matters. I wish I had the time in my
young days to do so.
Anyway, the point I am trying to make is that the word "Hindus-
tani" is ALSO a part of this controversy. We can use this term
to describe many things, like "Hindustani tehzeeb" (meaning
"Indian culture"), "Hindustani mauseeqi" (meaning "Indian music)
etc. Thus, the word simply means "of Hindustan". One can take
the word "Hindustan" to mean the present-day "India, that is
Bharat". I believe this latter expression is enshrined in the
Indian Constitution. One can also use this term "Hindustan" to
refer to pre-Partition (British) India, including the Princely
States. Personally, I have no problem with either interpreta-
tion, since (essentially) it is a geographic entity that we are
talking about
The problem or controversy arises when this term "Hindustani"
is used to describe a language. Traditionally, or so I think,
Urdu-wallahs have always, or mostly, used the term "Urdu" to talk
about or discuss the Urdu language. I am open to correction, but
the word "Hindustani" {in the context of a language} has come
into vogue as a term of compromise. Some people have advocated
that most of the "non-indigenous" content of Urdu vocabulary
(i.e. Persian, Arabic, Turkish words and their derivatives)
should be given up, so that the language can be understood by a
larger segment of the population. Urdu-wallahs have consistently
rejected this demand or suggestion. For them, this so-called
"non-indigenous" content is part and parcel of the language and
its complete exclusion would alter the fundamental structure of
the language. In other words, "Urdu" would no longer be "Urdu",
as the world in general, and Urdu-wallahs in particular, have
known the language for ages. Ghalib and Iqbal (to name just a
couple of poets) would no longer be called Urdu poets.
Please try to understand my point --- I am not getting into the
controversy whether this demand is justified or not. I am only
trying to present the perspective of Urdu-lovers.
You have asked a question :
"Is there an accepted Roman script for Hindustani ?"
My request to you would be to kindly drop this reference to the
word "Hindustani". Only a vastly truncated Urdu language can
possibly be referred to as "Hindustani". And the actual language
we talk about and discuss in our Newsgroup has always been "Urdu"
in its non-truncated form, or the form in which Urdu-wallahs have
always used and understood it.
I am open to correction, once again, but "Hindustani" is NOT a
language recognized by the Indian Constitution. This document
recognizes, perhaps, 18 languages, including Urdu and Hindi,
but NOT "Hindustani". So the latter has no official existence.
Just before the country's Partition, I believe a sincere attempt
was made by well-meaning people to achieve some sort of a common
ground or consensus for a language that would be acceptable to
a vast majority of people. The term "Hindustani" was given to
this language. There was an extensive debate in the Indian
Parliament (or Constituent Assembly perhaps ?) in 1946, but the
proposal was lost by a solitary vote. I have a vague recollec-
tion that the decisive negative vote was cast by Babu Rajendra
Prasad, who later became the Indian President. As I said
earlier, I have not delved deeply in these matters. Maybe some-
one else can write more authoritatively on the subject of this
constitutional debate. Or maybe I myself could do so, after
some time.
Since "Hindustani", as a separate language, has no official
or realistic existence, we have to think about a Roman script
for the "Urdu" language --- a language that continues to be
graced by the writings of Ghalib, Iqbal, Jigar, Hasrat, Faani,
Faiz, Saahir, Ahmed Faraz etc.
A worthy ALUPer Janaab Sarwar Alam Saheb had devised a Roman
script for this non-truncated form of Urdu. I think it was
some 4-5 years back. Please search the ALUP archives for
2004 and 2005. I am sure you will find it.
Of course, the pains taken by Sarwar Saheb must be commended.
But, honestly, I feel that the system or "nizaam" worked out
by him may prove unworkable for many or even most of us.
Once you have located his system (as given on our Forum), you
can try it out for yourself.
I am given to understand that a software has been designed by
someone in India, which enables the user to use 'nast'aleeq"
font for everday e-mail or other writing purposes. The name
of the Software is probably "InPage". It is not a free
Software. And I don't think it is widely used, except by a
very few.
For the time being, at least, I think we may have to do with
our present practices viz. writing ALUP posts in the English
language. And while quoting Urdu poetry, use our own simple
equivalent system. Over the past ten years or so, I have
followed my own system --- nothing very remarkable about it.
I suppose it may work for you too.
Afzal
Naseer
Thank you for the Balraj Sahni link. I have a soft spot in my heart
for this gentleman.Having seen him in a number of films, I always
thought he would be just as decent a human being in real life as he
was portrayed on screen. In addition, whilst I was at university, I
got a Punjabi book (in Gurmukhi script) from the city library. This
book, called "merii Pakistan yaatraa", was written by him and I read a
part of it. I only managed to read a part of it because I had newly
learnt to read Gurmukhi and it was hard work trying to decipher the
words. I found out from the book that Balraj Sahib hailed from
Rawalpindi which is only 60 miles from my birth place. (Sunil Datt,
one could say, *was* from my place...or I am from *his* place!!).
You touched on the point of Roman Urdu and I believe Sushil Sahib has
rightly indicated that Roman Urdu was indeed older than the Balraaj
Sahni era. Balraj Sahib supported the usage of Latin script for a
common ground "Urdu/Hindi" language, called Hindustani. More on this
below.
Jamil Sahib has been reminiscing about his experiences related to
Urdu/
Hindi and Afzal Sahib talked about PunDit Jawaahar Lal Nahru's
speeches. My personal experiences are somewhat akin to Jamil Sahib's.
Allow me to relate one or two of these experiences.
I am not sure I was even aware of such a language as Hindi, whilst I
was in Pakistan. I grew up in the Punjab with Urdu. We did not have a
radio or television at home. So, I was not exposed to any Indian
media. We did manage to get a radio just before the September 1965
Indo-Pakistan war. I do remeber listening to "Aakaash-vaaNRii" from
Jalandhar but I can not really remember what the Hindi sounded like.
Coming to England at the end of 66 brought me in direct contact with
our neighbours about whom I had only heard about from my parents. In
my class, there were Hindu and Sikh boys, all from the Punjab and
although the memory of the recent war was fresh in our minds, we were
too busy trying to survive in a harsh bullying atmosphere that we
hardly ever argued over India/Pakistan issues. They would talk about
Hindi films and I was curious to know what this language was. My home
town Jhelum had three cinemas but believe it or not, I had never had
the opportunity of seeing any film there. My first experience of
watching a "Hindi" film was when I went with my father, my uncle and a
few other people to see a film called "aasraa". My father told me
about Ashok Kumar but I did not get to find out who the hero and
heroine were. At the time, I can't remember what the censor board
certificate said. No doubt, it would have said "Hindi" but I thought
the film was certainly in Urdu!!
Much later on I travelled to London to see "Shatranj ke khilaaRii".
The cinema board was advertising the film as a "Hindi" film and after
having the seen the film, I picked an argument with the cinema manager
and insisted that the film was Urdu and not Hindi!! At university, I
had Hindu and Sikh friends from Gujarat/Punjab/Rajasthan and Nepal
backgrounds. They of course always talked about Hindi films and Hindi
songs. The Gujarati friend of mine had a number of Rafi songs and he
said he really loved "Hindi" songs because Hindi was such a lovely
sweet language. I asked him to play for me a song of his choice. He
played the title song from the film "aap aa'e bahaar aa'ii" . I said
"But this is Urdu!!" He told me it could n't be as he did not
understand Urdu. I asked him what the words "viiraanii, be-qaraar,
iHsaan, gulistaan .." from the song meant. He could not explain to me
their meanings. On a side note, my friends called the local Pakistani
shops as Indian shops!! My Gujarati friend even went as far as to say
that there were more Pakistanis in India than there are Pakistanis in
Pakistan!! I did n't quite understand at first what he meant but then
I
cottoned on.
Whatever the pre-partion people thought of Urdu/Hindi, I am certain
that those who were born in only Urdu (Pakistan) and only Hindi
(India) background, do term the language of films as Urdu and Hindi
respectively with complete sincerity. From the Indian perspective
whether it
is "muGhal-i-a'zam" film or "Mahaa Bhaarat" play, they are both Hindi.
I think, we will just have to agree to disagree as this is a very
emotive subject, as Jamil Sahib has rightly pointed out.
Now coming to the concept of Hindustani and the usage of Latin script
to write it. The situation in the real world is as Afzal Sahib has
pointed out in his latest post and I am in complete agreement with
him. However, in an ideal word, I could agree with Balraaj Sahni's
sentiments.
We all know that the Sub-continent has numerous scripts. As well as
Urdu script, there is the Devanaagri script used for Hindi/Marathi/
Nepali and perhaps other languages. There are also Bengali and
Gurmukhi scripts based on the Devanagri script. Then there are many
scripts employed in the South Indian languages. If there was an All
India Script (based on the International Phonetic Script), one could
have had a script for "Hindustani" (if the Urdu-waalaas and Hindi-
waalas were in agreement) and this would have brought Urdu/Hindi in
one fold. The Arabic/Persian words one had in the language on the one
hand and Sanscrit words on the other, might have found a happy
equilibrium. This is just my view. Also, Punjabi in Shahmukhi and
Gurmukhi would have been written in one script and brought these two
"varities" under one umbrella. Perhaps there are other similar
examples. There would of course have been a huge task of converting
all the literature into this Roman script. For the purposes of reading
religious scripts, one could still have learnt the appropriate
scripts. But who is living in utopia?
KHair-andesh,
Naseer
Afzal A. Khan
Sorry for self-follow up.
I referred to the system devised by Sarwar Alam Saheb. It is
very comprehensive. Unfortunately, his article explaining
the system is available only in Urdu, and in a very small font.
At the time he first announced his system, he said he was
working on an English version of his article. But I do not
know if he ever completed it. The system incorporates various
equivalents for the complex phonetics of the Urdu language and
also the different letters which, essentially, represent the
same sound. For example :
silsila = The Urdu letter used here for 's' is
'seen'.
saabit karna = To prove. Here the Urdu letter used
for "s' is 'se'.
saaf = Clean. Here the Urdu letter used for
's' is 'swaad'.
The system also covers other idiosyncratic nuances of the Urdu
script.
It is not possible to explain the system in any kind of detail
here. But I can try to give you a brief glimpse of what the
system is like, by giving below a list of words, as written in
the ordinary system (such as I use), and also as per Sarwar
Saheb's system. Then you can really see how complicated it is :
Ordinary System Sarwar Saheb's System
--------------- ---------------------
fuzool (futile) fuZ^ool
mazaameen (articles) maZ^aameen
mauzoo' (topic) mauZ^oo'
soorat (method, device) Soorat
GHalatee (error, mistake) Ghalat^ee
yaqeenan (definitely) yaqeena"
matlab (meaning) mat^lab
behs (discussion) beHc
usool (principle) uSool
harf (letter) Harf
beh'r (metre) beHr
tarah (like) t^araH
jaaye & liye jaaYe & liYe
saheeh (correct) SaHeeH
misaaleN (examples) micaaleN
I am sure you will see the difficulties involved in using Sarwar
Saheb's system.
You had also referred to the transliteration system followed in
RMIM (the Music Newsgroup). The system used there for quoting
song-lyrics etc. is known as "iTrans". I have always believed
that this system is not suitable, as far as transcribing Urdu
writings is concerned. as it does not adequately or correctly
represent several Urdu sounds and usages. There have been
several heated discussions on this issue in RMIM. I will refer
you to just one thread, with a request to read completely all
the posts in their entirety. In due course, please do tell us
how many such posts (in just that one thread) were you able to
read in their entirety !!
Noor-e-tarannum: ai vatan ke sajiile javaano.n
The above thread started around September 17th 2002.
Another thread in RMIM on this subject is "iTrans" -- just that.
It commenced sometime around 28th April 2004.
Afzal
PremC...@gmail.com
> Afzal A. Khan wrote:
-----------------------------------------------------
Dosto,
I now realize how politically charged this subject is. A language is a
means of communication. Nobody can own it. We all know Urdu when we
hear it and understand it and love it. I am happy that it has been
given a political identity in Pakistan. But if for political
correctness they remove Hindi words, Urdu becomes poorer. Why not
start removing Persian words. After all Nadir shah gave us hell! Will
that be Urdu. Can Ghalib and Mir poetry be the same if we remove
words that are not politically correct ? In some chat rooms I have
heard that Ghalib was a Pakistani Poet!!!! Ghalib didnt even enter
the area now called Pakistan as far as I know.
If Urdu now belongs to Pakistan and they want to change it, and
Hindustani is a dirty word, Lets keep Urdu as it is and start calling
it Rekhta !! But lets not change it to something else for political
correctness.
Lets take English as an example. It has words from so many languages.
Nobody talks about politically correct English by removing foreign
words.
Lets talk about pronunciation. Yes Urdu has some complex sounds. Well
so does German and French. . Surely we can add a few characters like
the German and the French in Roman to add those special Urdu sounds.
After all what is correct pronunciation? Even Urdu in Allahabad,
Delhi and Lucknow is different from that in Hyderbad and Pakistan.
That does't diminish it in any way. English is pronounced differently
all over the world. In USA, English in the south is so different from
the north. They still love Shakespeare and aspire to read and write
good English. Well so be it with Urdu.
I raised the question of script. It is difficult to learn too many
scripts. We are already using Roman individually in our own way. If
we standardize it Slowly we can get transliterations of the great
works in Urdu in Roman. It’s a very simple proposition. For those
who want the original script, well more power to them.
Any way, I have shared my feelings. There are no shortcuts. I should
improve my reading writing of Urdu script stop dreaming of a Roman
script.
Sincerely
PJ
Naseer
wrote:
mere muHtaram Prem Joshi Sahib, aadaab-o-tasliimaat.
merii samajh meN nahiiN aa rahaa kih aap ke dil ko kaun-sii baat se
Thes pahuNchii hai? maiN ne tamaam KHutuut ek baar phir paRhe haiN awr
mujhe to in meN ko'ii aisii chiiz nazar nahiiN aa'ii jo baa'is-i-
takliif ho saktii ho. agar ho sake to baat kii vazaaHat kar diijiye.
mihr-baanii ho gii.
aap ne Naziir Akbar-aabaadii kaa zikr kiyaa hai. in dinoN maiN ne in
kii do nazmeN pesh kii haiN. ALUP meN awr bhii nazmeN mil saktii haiN.
mujhe aap se ham-dardii hai kih aap ko Urdu rasmu_lKHat meN Urdu
paRhne ke liye munaasib mavaad nahiiN mil rahaa. yih sach hai kih
aksar kitaaboN kii kitaabat mi'yaarii nahiiN hotii awr Huruuf bhii
baariik hote haiN. awr agar kisii bhii script ko lagaataar nah paRhaa
jaa'e to paRhne meN bahut dushvaarii hotii hai awr aaNkhoN par yih
kaam bhaarii paRtaa hai. merii bhii yahii Haalat hotii hai jab maiN
shaaz-o-naadir Gurmukhi yaa Devaa-naagrii paRhne kii koshish kartaa
huuN. merii raa'e hai kih aap apnii maqaamii library se baRe Huruuf
meN likhii hu'ii kitaaboN kii farmaa'ish kareN jin se aap ko paRhne
meN muhaarat ho gii. duusraa tariiqah yih hai kih aap vuh kitaabeN
paRheN jo bachchoN ke liye likhii ga'ii hoN. 'umuum-an un kaa font
baRaa hotaa hai awr likhaa'ii safaa'ii ke saath hotii hai. kuchh
practice ke ba'd aap bilaa kisii mushkil ke ko'ii bhii Urdu kii kitaab
paRh sakeN ge. Roman meN agar aap ko ek aadh Ghazal yaa nazm yaa ko'ii
kitaab mil bhii jaa'e phir bhii is se aap kii pyaas to nahiiN bujhe
gii nah?
aap ke dil ko KHush karne ke liye maiN aap kii KHidmat meN Naziir
Akbar-aabaadii kaa kalaam pesh kar rahaa huuN jise mujhe merii ek
Amriikaa meN muqiim Hindustani bahin ne bhejaa thaa.
http://mohib.net/blog/2006/12/husn-e-jaana-by-muzaffar-ali/
aap kaa,
Naseer
Afzal A. Khan
> Any way, I have shared my feelings. There are no shortcuts. I should
> improve my reading writing of Urdu script stop dreaming of a Roman
> script.
>
> Sincerely
>
> PJ
Joshi-ji,
It is obvious that you are very upset, and I cannot quite
understand why. There was nothing offensive in my replies.
I did not get involved in any "politics" nor was there any
mention of Pakistan and what those folks "across the border"
may or may not be doing with this language.
Let me clarify one point right at the beginning. Like you,
UVR Saheb, Zoya Saheba etc., I too am from India. Urdu is
my mother tongue and I love the language.
You say that "nobody can own a language". Probably, in "TheTh"
language, you wanted to say that "yeh zabaan (bhasha) PakistaniyoN
ki ya kisi KHaas tabqe (ethnic group) ki jaagir naheeN hai".
May I say in reply that any language IS owned by its lovers.
I "own" this language, as do, say, UVR Saheb and Naseer Saheb.
For genuine lovers of a language, their own geographical origin
doesn't matter one bit. Lovers of Urdu would be found all over
the world : USA, UK, Canada, Germany, Norway, Holland, Botswana,
Qatar, Bahrain, South Africa, Bangladesh etc. etc.
Long before Pakistan gave Urdu a "political identity", as you
put it, this beautiful language of ours enjoyed an overwhelming
"popular identity" of its own in undivided India, particularly in
areas which today lie in "India that is Bharat".
You must have seen from the link provided by Sushil Sharma Saheb
in his post that a special Association was set up in Lahore in the
year 1878, which was named as the "Roman-Urdu Society". A special
journal was brought out by the Society which was designated as the
"Roman-Urdu Journal". The operations of the Association were
extended to Persian, Sanskrit, Hindi and, of course, to Urdu as
well. This itself would go to prove that Urdu was considered a
dominant language in large parts of the country. It isn't as if
Pakistan "invented" the language or became its exclusive owner.
You state that Hindi words have been removed form Urdu, "across
the border", for 'political correctness'. I cannot say if this is
indeed true. At least I am not aware of any conscious, sustained
and concerted attempts in this direction. I also believe that
no such attempt is being made in India.
In my reply, I did point out that no such language by the name of
"Hindustani" is recognized by the Indian Constitution. If this
assertion is wrong, I will readily own up my mistake. The refe-
rence to the lengthy debates in the Indian Constituent Assembly
on this issue {"Hindustani" versus "Hindi"} is also historically
correct. The debate did rage on, right upto 1949 I think.
There is no need to bring in Nadir Shah in these discussions. The
people of Delhi who were massacred by him included folks speaking
Persian, Arabic, Turkish and Urdu also.
You have referred to chat rooms. ALUP is not a chat room. And,
to my knowledge, no regular ALUP participant frequents these
chat rooms. If you do, you do so at your own peril.
Let me repeat once again that Urdu does NOT belong to Pakistan
alone. It was and continues to be an Indian language. Maybe,
there is a larger number of people in India, as compared to
Pakistan, who understand and use the Urdu language. Also, I
believe Urdu originated and flourished in an area which continues
to be an integral part of present-day India. The earlier form of
Urdu (which was known as Deccani Urdu) also developed in the area
in and around Hyderabad. Thus India may possibly have a much
greater claim on this beautiful language.
As for "Hindustani" (language) being a dirty word, let me
repeat, once again, that there is no such recognized language.
And the people responsible for this were those Hindi-wallahs who
voted against it in the Constituent Assembly Debates. I have
already indicated that "Hindustani" lost by a single vote.
I have always been curious about one aspect of such debates and
discussions. Urdu-wallahs, to my knowledge, do not fulminate
against the Hindi language. They don't seem to mind if it is
highly Sanskriticised or has become very difficult to understand
for the ordinary individual. In most such cases, it is always
the other way round and I can't see why it is so. Why can't we
"live and let live" ? There are always demands for changing the
Urdu script. There are those who keep on advocating that Persian
or Arabic words should be removed from the language. Why ?
If the practitioners of Urdu are happy and content with its
traditional form, why try to disturb it ?
ALUP has comparatively few members. Maybe, around 15 or 16 only.
A few of us are die-hard members like UVR Saheb and Yours Truly.
We are never worried about there being only so few members. We
try to keep the discussions going on. And when other members
join in, we welcome them with the utmost sincerity, even when
they are not all that familiar with the language. We always
try to help them out. A recent example would be the Nasir
Kazimi thread, when I put in an explanatory note about some
diacritical marks. Or your own query about a Roman script. I
did try to help you by giving examples from Sarwar Saheb's
system. I will readily admit that this was no big deal in
either case, but this will definitely go to show our sincerity
in welcoming newcomers.
Let us examine this from another perspective. When a stranger
arrives in a house and is welcomed with open arms, should he
start finding fault with the layout of the house ?
If people love Urdu, but are not so familiar with it, let them
try hard to learn its vocabulary, grammar, script and other
nuances. If they find it difficult, should they start demanding
short-cuts and easy-way-outs ? Should they seek to dilute this
beautiful language ?
So far, it has not been feasible to use the Urdu script for our
Newsgroup. But we are making do with the Roman script as best
we can. Can we not carry on in this fashion ?
And it is not merely a question of script alone. The language
itself is very important. Let us examine the following prose
sentence :
"Jeevan ke dukhoN ka aNt to kewal mrityu se hi sambhav hai.
Dekho na --- mom batti ko bhor hone tak jalna hi
paRta hai."
It may be possible to put this idea in verse form. But the
language is certainly not Urdu, as we know it.
And, now let us see this idea as penned by Ghalib :
GHam-e-hasti ka Asad kis se ho juz marg 'ilaaj
Shama' har raNg men jalti hai sahar hone tak
Should we take Ghalib to task for using this language ? Or,
since he is not around, should we berate his admirers or the
practitioners of this language ?
Afzal
UVR
>
> And it is not merely a question of script alone. The language
> itself is very important. Let us examine the following prose
> sentence :
>
> "Jeevan ke dukhoN ka aNt to kewal mrityu se hi sambhav hai.
> Dekho na --- mom batti ko bhor hone tak jalna hi
> paRta hai."
>
> It may be possible to put this idea in verse form. But the
> language is certainly not Urdu, as we know it.
>
So, what if we said:
jeevan ke dukhoN kaa ant sirf maut se ho saktaa hai. diye ko saveraa
hone tak jalna hi paRtaa hai.
Is this Urdu? What about the lines "jeevan se bhari teri aaNkheN
majboor kareN jeene ke liye"? After all, Urdu poets of some repute
have been using the words 'jeevan', 'dukh' etc in their poetry and
calling it Urdu poetry and nobody has objected.
> And, now let us see this idea as penned by Ghalib :
>
> GHam-e-hasti ka Asad kis se ho juz marg 'ilaaj
> Shama' har raNg men jalti hai sahar hone tak
>
> Should we take Ghalib to task for using this language ? Or,
> since he is not around, should we berate his admirers or the
> practitioners of this language ?
I am not sure we should be using use Ghalib's language as a yardstick
to determine what is (or should be) treated as Urdu. I mean, Ghalib's
language is Urdu, unquestionably, but is his the only kind of
vocabulary that admits of being acceptable as "Urdu"? I think not. I
hope not. Ghalib was mushkil-pasand not only in the metaphors and
images he used, but also in the vocabulary he purposely employed.
Many of his predecessors, a number of his contemporaries and most of
his successors in Urdu poetry have used "simpler" vocabulary than
Ghalib and have still been ungrudgingly accepted as Urdu asaateza by
the critics -- I mean Dagh and Hasrat, I mean Jigar and Firaq, I mean
Faiz and Faraz. On the other side of the 'coin', a number of Farsi/
Arabic words can be found in the works of Hindi kavis of all ages.
So, just because Aakaashvaani's "hindi samaachaar" features Hindi from
the extreme Sanskrit-end of the spectrum and Urdu service's "Khabrein"
Urdu from the extreme Farsi/Arabic end, it should not mean those are
the only languages that qualify as Hindi and Urdu. What about the
language the average Hindi-speaking Lucknowi uses or the tongue an
Urdu-wallah Allahabadi speaks, which is at neither end of the
spectrum.
What I'm saying is that as practitioners of Urdu or Hindi, we should
not allow ourselves to get carried away and adopt a "Hindi vs. Urdu"
attitude. When the Heavens of Urdu didn't come crumbling down by Faiz
saying "aur bhi dukh haiN zamaane meN muhabbat ke siwaa", why should
they crash if someone else uses "jiivan" instead of "zindagii" or
"ziist", or even "darpan" or "darshan" versus "aa'eena" or "deed".
And vice versa for Hindi kavitaa?
Many long decades of isolation and insulation have passed with both
Hindi- and Urdu-wallahs pointing to this, that and the other and
declaring "this is not Hindi" or "this cannot be Urdu". We can
plainly see where it has gotten us. Maybe it's time to try a
different approach.
-UVR.
PS: By a "different approach" I *DO NOT* mean supplanting the Urdu
script and Devanagari and replacing them with some form of a Roman
substitute. I do not support that point of view at all. But maybe,
for example, we could be a little less antagonistic to someone who
wants to write Urdu in the Hindi script. Or vice versa. If that's
how Hindi-wallahs will fall in love with Urdu, or Urdu-wallahs with
Hindi, I think it's completely worth it.
Afzal A. Khan
Right now, I am pressed for time. But I will definitely try to
respond to your views and arguments in a day or so.
Afzal
Naseer
aaKHir aap se rahaa nahiiN gayaa!! kyaa ham ise "va'dah-shikanii" kah
sakte haiN?:)
KHair-andesh,
Naseer
UVR
Naseer saahib,
ab to mujhe poora poora yaqeen ho gaya k aap ke "neighborhood" meN koi
chor-uchakka apni shaamat aaye hi aataa hogaa :) aap ki "police-si"
nigaahoN se bache to koi!
to kahiye, meri sazaa kyaa hai?
-UVR.
UVR
upon a few interesting links that provide additional fodder to the
topic of "Hindustani". These are to be taken into consideration vide
Afzal Khan saahib's verifiably correct assertion that Hindustani is
not a language recognized under the Indian constitution.
First, we have Premchand's "Urdu, Hindi aur Hindustani". Many of us,
I am sure, have read this already --
http://www.columbia.edu/itc/mealac/pritchett/00urduhindilinks/shacklesnell/315premchand.pdf
Second, a fairly recent paper from the Annual of Urdu Studies, which
publication ALUPers are quite familiar with. "The Persistence of
Hindustani" --
http://www.urdustudies.com/pdf/20/09RaiHindustani.pdf
And finally, a young non-Indian, non-Pakistani person who seems to
think that "Hindustani is spoken in Pakistan"! A certain amount of
close attention will need to be paid as the diction is not what we are
normally used to --
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IBqRMlXTNyU
Now, I have absolutely no clue why the speaker in the video thinks
what she does (that Hindustani is spoken in Pakistan), but it does
looks like this person couldn't possibly have any "vested interest",
political or otherwise, in the whole Urdu/Hindi "controversy!"
-UVR.
Afzal A. Khan
I have already indicated that I would try to send a reply to your
earlier post in a day or so. Right now, I am pressed for time.
I have now seen your above post too. And this also needs a
reply. Hopefully I shall send it too. I have already gone
through the contents of the first two links. The third
(YouTube) link didn't work for me.
So please bear with me.
Afzal
Naseer
> Idly surfing the web today for something totally unrelated, I chanced
> upon a few interesting links that provide additional fodder to the
> topic of "Hindustani". These are to be taken into consideration vide
> Afzal Khan saahib's verifiably correct assertion that Hindustani is
> not a language recognized under the Indian constitution.
>
> First, we have Premchand's "Urdu, Hindi aur Hindustani". Many of us,
> I am sure, have read this already --
>
> Second, a fairly recent paper from the Annual of Urdu Studies, which
> publication ALUPers are quite familiar with. "The Persistence of
> Hindustani" --
> http://www.urdustudies.com/pdf/20/09RaiHindustani.pdf
>
> And finally, a young non-Indian, non-Pakistani person who seems to
> think that "Hindustani is spoken in Pakistan"! A certain amount of
> close attention will need to be paid as the diction is not what we are
> normally used to --
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IBqRMlXTNyU
>
> Now, I have absolutely no clue why the speaker in the video thinks
> what she does (that Hindustani is spoken in Pakistan), but it does
> looks like this person couldn't possibly have any "vested interest",
> political or otherwise, in the whole Urdu/Hindi "controversy!"
janaab-i-UVR Sahib, aadaab.
kyaa aap Prem Chand kii Devanagri 'ibaarat ko Roman meN pesh kar sakte
haiN taa kih is se vuh log bhii faa'idah uThaa sakeN jin ke liye yih
rasmu_lKHat Ghair-maanuus-o-ajnabii hai?
Naseer
Naseer
janaab-i-UVR Sahib, aadaab 'arz hai.
Please do not take my post as if I were "aiding and abetting" you,
since it is you who have decided to participate in this (possibly)
acrimonious debate:) I must admit, I am absolutely amazed at the
number of people who speak (write) in defence of Hindi and the
frequency at which this phenomenon takes place in ALUP. I wonder how
often this kind of debate takes place in alt.hindi-- -- group. My own
feeling can be summarised in one of my posts in this thread and that
was simply saying "let us agree to disagree". However, it seems,, this
Urdu/Hindi debate will outlive all of us!!
It is obvious that there is a certain amount of confusion in people's
minds as to what constitutes literary Urdu and what are the
ingredients of literary Hindi. In one of your older posts you asked
what the word for "definition" was in Urdu. I believe Raj Kumar Sahib
explained that the best translation would be "ta'riif".
As you are 'at home"in both Urdu and Hindi and perhaps even more so
than your mother tongue and the well-known fact that your scholarly
knowledge in linguistics and poetry of these languages and beyond
outstrips most of us mortals, I am sure ALUPers would welcome your
"ta'riif" of both Urdu and Hindi. To the best of my knowledge, I am
not sure if you have spelled out your stance on this subject in clear,
unambiguous terms.
KHair-andesh,
Naseer
Rajiv Chakravarti
> janaab-i-UVR Sahib, aadaab.
>
> kyaa aap Prem Chand kii Devanagri 'ibaarat ko Roman meN pesh kar sakte
> haiN taa kih is se vuh log bhii faa'idah uThaa sakeN jin ke liye yih
> rasmu_lKHat Ghair-maanuus-o-ajnabii hai?
>
> Naseer- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -
aadaab 'arz:
go k. UVR saahib se darKhwaast kee gayee hai, kuchch vaqt milaa tha to
aap sab ki Khidmat meiN "Roman" meiN Premchand ki tahreer darj-e-zail
hai.. ummeed hai kisi kaam aaye.. jaldi meiN agar "transcription" meiN
koi
GhalatiyaaN hoN to baraaye-karam nazar.andaaz kar deejiyegaa. aapka
mamnoon rahooNga.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
desh meiN aise aadmiyoN ki sankhyaa kam naheeN hai jo Urdu aur Hindi
ki alag alag aur svatantr unnati aur vikaas ke maarg meiN baadhak
naheeN
hona chaahte. unhoN ne yeh maan liya hai k. aarambh meiN in donoN ke
svaroopoN meiN chaahe jo kuchch ektaa aur samaantaa rahi ho, lekin
phir
bhi is samay donoN ki donoN jis raaste par jaa rahi haiN, use dekhte
hue in donoN meiN mel aur ektaa honaa asambhav hi hai. pratyek
bhaashaa
ki ek praakr_tik pravr_tti hoti hai. Urdu kaa Faarsi aur Arabi ke
saath
svaabhaavik sambandh hai. unki yeh pravr_tti ham kisi shakti se rok
naheeN sake. phir in donoN ko aapas meiN milaane ka prayatn kar ke ham
kyoN vyarth in donoN ko haani pahuNchaaveN?
yadi Urdu aur hindi donoN apne aapko apne janm_sthaan aur prachaar
kshetr
tak hi parimit rakheN to hameN inki vr_ddhi aur vikaas ke sambandh
meiN
koi aapatti na ho. Banglaa, Marathi, Gujarati, Tamil, Telgu* aur
KannaD* aadi praanteey bhaashaaoN ke sambandh meiN hameN kisi prakaar
ki chinta naheeN hai. unheN adhikaar hai k. ve apne andar chaahe jitni
Sanskr_t, arabi yaa Latin aadi bharti chaleN. un bhashaaoN ke lekhak
aadi
svayaM hi is baat ka nirNay kar sakte haiN; parantu Urdu aur Hindi ki
baat
in sab se alag hai. yahaaN to donoN ko Bhaaratvarsh ki raashTreey
bhaashaa
kahlaane ka daava karti haiN. parantu ve apne vyaktigat roop meiN
raashTreey aavashshyaktaaoN kee poorti naheeN kar sakeeN aur isi lilye
saNyakt roop meiN svayaM hi unkaa saNyog aur mel aarambh ho gayaa.
aur
donoN ka voh sam_milit svaroop utpann ho gaya jise ham bahut Theek
taur
par Hindustaani zabaan kahte haiN. vaastavik baat to yeh hai k.
Bhaaratvarsh
ki raashTreey bhaashaa na to voh Urdu hi ho sakti hai jo Arabi aur
Farsi
ke aprachalit tathaa kaThin shabdoN ke bhaar se ladi rahti hai aur na
voh
Hindi hi ho sakti hai jo Sanskr_t ke kaThin shabdoN se ladi hui hoti
hai.
yadi in donoN bhaashaaoN ke paksh_paati aur samarthak aamne-saame
khaRe
ho kar apni saahityik bhaashaaoN meiN baateN kareN to shaayad ek
doosre
ka kuchch bhi matlab na samajh sakeN. hamaari raashTreey bhaasha to
vohi
ho sakti hai jis ka aadhaar sarva-saamaanya bodh_gamyata ho - jise sab
log
sahaj meiN samajh sakeN. voh is baat ki kyoN parvaah karne lagi(!) k.
amuk shabd is liye chhoR diya jaana chaahiye k. voh Faarsi, Arabi
athvaa
Sanskr_t ka hai? voh to keval yeh maandaND apne saamne rakhti hai k.
jan_saadhaaraN yeh shabd samajh sakte haiN yaa naheeN? yaa
jan_saadhaaraN
meiN Hindu, Musalmaan, Punjaabi, Bangaali, MaharaasTreey aur Gujarati
sabhi sam_milit haiN. yadi koi shabd yaa muhaavra yaa paaribhaashik
shabd jan_saadhaaraN meiN prachalit hai to phir voh is baat ki parvaah
naheeN karti k. voh kahaaN se niklaa hai aur kahaaN se aaya hai. aur
yehi
Hindustaani hai. aur jis prakaar angrezoN ki bhaashaa Angrezi, Jaapaan
ki
bhaashaa Jaapaani, Iran ki Irani aur Cheen ki Cheeni hai, usi prakaar
Hindustaan ki raashTreey bhaashaa ko isi taur par Hindustaani na kah
kar
keval Hind kaheN to iski bhaashaa Hindi kah sakte haiN. lekin yahaaN
ki
bhaashaa ko Urdu to kisi prakaar kahaa hi naheeN jaa sakta, jab tak
ham Hindustaan ko Urdustaan na kahne lageN, jo ab kisi prakaar
sambhav hi naheeN hai. praacheen kaal ke log yahaaN ki bhaashaa ko
Hindi
hi kahte the.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
faqat,
RC
UVR
> UVR wrote:
> > Idly surfing the web today for something totally unrelated, I chanced
> > upon a few interesting links that provide additional fodder to the
> > topic of "Hindustani". These are to be taken into consideration vide
> > Afzal Khan saahib's verifiably correct assertion that Hindustani is
> > not a language recognized under the Indian constitution.
>
> > First, we have Premchand's "Urdu, Hindi aur Hindustani". Many of us,
> > I am sure, have read this already --
>
> > Second, a fairly recent paper from the Annual of Urdu Studies, which
> > publication ALUPers are quite familiar with. "The Persistence of
> > Hindustani" --
> > http://www.urdustudies.com/pdf/20/09RaiHindustani.pdf
>
> > And finally, a young non-Indian, non-Pakistani person who seems to
> > think that "Hindustani is spoken in Pakistan"! A certain amount of
> > close attention will need to be paid as the diction is not what we are
> > normally used to --
> > http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IBqRMlXTNyU
>
> > Now, I have absolutely no clue why the speaker in the video thinks
> > what she does (that Hindustani is spoken in Pakistan), but it does
> > looks like this person couldn't possibly have any "vested interest",
> > political or otherwise, in the whole Urdu/Hindi "controversy!"
>
> > -UVR.
>
> I have already indicated that I would try to send a reply to your
> earlier post in a day or so. Right now, I am pressed for time.
>
> I have now seen your above post too. And this also needs a
> reply. Hopefully I shall send it too. I have already gone
> through the contents of the first two links. The third
> (YouTube) link didn't work for me.
>
> So please bear with me.
>
> Afzal
Afzal saahib,
I must thank you for sending in the above response even in the face of
your being pressed for time. I will eagerly wait for your promised
posts.
Regarding the YouTube link, if the problem was that the video showed
up with the error "This video has been removed" (or something to that
effect), then just reloading the URL [control-R in Firefox], or a cut-
and-paste of the URL into the browser's address-bar should do the
trick. I have verified that the video does exist and both the above
tricks work for me in Firefox.
One thing. My main intent in supplying the Premchand, Alok Rai and
YouTube links was simply this -- to show that we should not let the
Indian Constitution tell us what language exists, or doesn't exist.
Bhojpuri, Awadhi, Brajbhasha ...
-UVR.
Afzal A. Khan
UVR Saheb,
Fortunately, the YouTube link worked today, even without employing
the two tricks mentioned by you.
The Japanese girl might not have any personal "axe to grind" or
"vested interest" herself. But, it seems, she was merely reading
out something that was probably written and handed over to her.
It didn't seem as if these were her own personal views. I cannot
say whether the person who might have written that note had any
"vested interests" of his own. To use a phrase we have heard quite
often in recent times, this 'possibility' cannot be ruled out !
However, one point may be noted here : There are perhaps millions
of people in India (i.e. Bharat) who speak, read and write what is
regarded by common consensus as Pakistan's "qaumi zabaan" !!
In the totality of these circumstances, I feel this video should be
completely ignored in our discussions. But the other two links
need to be examined and dealt with.
I would prefer to do so (in regard to these links) in a separate
thread.
Afzal
UVR
> number of people who speak (write) in defence of Hindi and the
> frequency at which this phenomenon takes place in ALUP. I wonder how
> often this kind of debate takes place in alt.hindi-- -- group. My own
> feeling can be summarised in one of my posts in this thread and that
> was simply saying "let us agree to disagree". However, it seems,, this
> Urdu/Hindi debate will outlive all of us!!
>
> It is obvious that there is a certain amount of confusion in people's
> minds as to what constitutes literary Urdu and what are the
> ingredients of literary Hindi. In one of your older posts you asked
> what the word for "definition" was in Urdu. I believe Raj Kumar Sahib
> explained that the best translation would be "ta'riif".
>
> As you are 'at home"in both Urdu and Hindi and perhaps even more so
> than your mother tongue and the well-known fact that your scholarly
> knowledge in linguistics and poetry of these languages and beyond
> outstrips most of us mortals, I am sure ALUPers would welcome your
> "ta'riif" of both Urdu and Hindi. To the best of my knowledge, I am
> not sure if you have spelled out your stance on this subject in clear,
> unambiguous terms.
>
> KHair-andesh,
> Naseer
Naseer saahib, aadaab 'arz hai.
Please allow me, first of all, to state in clear and unambiguous terms
that I have NOT written anything in "defence of Hindi" here. What I
have done is to speak against the Hindi-Urdu divide. There's no love
lost in my heart for the contant reiterations of how wide the chasm is
that separates Hindi and Urdu.
Specifically, in my response to Afzal sb's post, what I have said is
that we Urdu wallahs NEED NOT adopt an antagonistic pose towards so-
called "Hindi" words -- for such a posture is evident much as we may
want to deny it -- nor should Hindi wallahs do so with purported
"Urdu" words. What's the harm, really, if Urdu poets start using more
Hindi or even Sanskrit words, and what's the harm if Hindi kavis
employ Farsi words? No, seriously, what is the harm? Won't the
languages only be enriched more and more as a more expansive
vocabulary is created?
I mean, if Hindi can accept the *as-is* borrowing of an unlimited
number of words from Sanskrit, why can't it accept the same from
Persian? And if Urdu can get *as-is* an unlimited number of Persian
words, why not an unlimited number of Sanskrit words as-is? No,
seriously, WHAT is preventing this? If there's no problem in writing
Hindi in the Roman script if the conditions demand it, why is there a
problem in writing it in Nast'aliq? And in writing Urdu in
Devanagari?
I can tell you the "problem" is not purely linguistic, because if it
were that, it would have been solved long ago. We all know what the
reasons for the widening Hindi/Urdu chasm are.
As for giving a definition of Hindi and/or Urdu, I will respectfully
demur. This is perhaps an even more emotionally charged issue than
the "ahl-e-zabaan" matter. When someone as knowledgeable and
experienced as Afzal saahib can stay mum on the one, an ignorant
fledgling like me can surely hold my peace on the other.
-UVR.
Naseer
wrote:
> On Jan 22, 2:37 am, Naseer <qures...@googlemail.com> wrote:
>
> > janaab-i-UVR Sahib, aadaab.
>
> > kyaa aap Prem Chand kii Devanagri 'ibaarat ko Roman meN pesh kar sakte
> > haiN taa kih is se vuh log bhii faa'idah uThaa sakeN jin ke liye yih
> > rasmu_lKHat Ghair-maanuus-o-ajnabii hai?
>
> > Naseer- Hide quoted text -
>
> > - Show quoted text -
>
> aadaab 'arz:
>
> go k. UVR saahib se darKhwaast kee gayee hai, kuchch vaqt milaa tha to
> aap sab ki Khidmat meiN "Roman" meiN Premchand ki tahreer darj-e-zail
> hai.. ummeed hai kisi kaam aaye.. jaldi meiN agar "transcription" meiN
> koi
> GhalatiyaaN hoN to baraaye-karam nazar.andaaz kar deejiyegaa. aapka
> mamnoon rahooNga.
>
>
> faqat,
> RC
janaab-i-Rajiv Chakravarti Sahib, aadaab 'arz hai.
aap ne Prem Chand ke mazmuun ko Roman meN muntaqil karne meN jo
takliif uThaa'ii hai us ke liye maiN aap kaa tah-i-dil se mamnuun
huuN.
bahut bahut shukriya janaab.
Naseer
Naseer
> upon a few interesting links that provide additional fodder to the
> topic of "Hindustani". These are to be taken into consideration vide
> Afzal Khan saahib's verifiably correct assertion that Hindustani is
> not a language recognized under the Indian constitution.
>
> First, we have Premchand's "Urdu, Hindi aur Hindustani". Many of us,
> I am sure, have read this already --
>
> Second, a fairly recent paper from the Annual of Urdu Studies, which
> publication ALUPers are quite familiar with. "The Persistence of
> Hindustani" --
> http://www.urdustudies.com/pdf/20/09RaiHindustani.pdf
>
> And finally, a young non-Indian, non-Pakistani person who seems to
> think that "Hindustani is spoken in Pakistan"! A certain amount of
> close attention will need to be paid as the diction is not what we are
> normally used to --
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IBqRMlXTNyU
>
> Now, I have absolutely no clue why the speaker in the video thinks
> what she does (that Hindustani is spoken in Pakistan), but it does
> looks like this person couldn't possibly have any "vested interest",
> political or otherwise, in the whole Urdu/Hindi "controversy!"
>
janaab-i-UVR Sahib, aadaab 'arz hai.
Thank you for the above links. Starting with the last, I have a hunch
that the word may have been "Hindko", which is a regional language of
Pakistan and the Japanese young lady, perhaps finding the word
difficult, read it as Hindustani. I am saying this because I have
never heard or read that there is such a language called Hindustani
spoken in Pakistan.
As for Prem Chand's so called "Hindustani" composition, I found great
difficulty in understanding it. I don't know if Zafar Sahib or Jamil
Sahib faired any better.
There is not much that I can say about the middle link. Hindustani was
a term used by the British. The idea of a common language may have
been great but it never took root. If Prem Chand's example is anything
to go by, then frankly I am not surprised.
KHair-Khvaah,
Naseer
Afzal A. Khan
Here is my promised reply to your post. I will try my best not to
make it overly long.....
Essentially, you have picked on an isolated part of my concluding
comments in one of my posts and tried to build your argument around
it. In other words, you have chosen to largely ignore the core
points of the original thread and my discussion with Shri Joshi ---
a discussion that was joined in by other ALUPers like Naseer Saheb
etc.
The whole thing began with your providing a link to a Convocation
Address given by Balraj Sahni at the the JNU in 1972. It has to be
remembered that this happened less than a year before the great
thespian passed away. I had gone through his speech in its entirety
but didn't really want to take it up in any rejoinder. I have
always had tremendous respect for him as an actor and as a fine
gentlemanly human being. But it is not a given that this respect
must be extended to the thoughts and sentiments expressed in this
Address too. It is a long and rambling speech, much of which can
be ignored, as far as our purposes are concerned.
But I will highlight a few of his observations, by quoting them
below :
1. "...it is an open secret that the songs and dialogues of these
Hindi films are mostly written in Urdu. Eminent Urdu writers and
poets-Krishan Chandar, Rajinder Singh Bedi, K. A. Abbas, Gulshan
Nanda, Sahir Ludhianwi, Majrooh Sultanpuri, and Kaifi Azmi are
associated with this work."
2. "...if a film written in Urdu can be called a Hindi film, it is
logical to conclude that Hindi and Urdu are one and, the same
language. But no, our British masters declared them two separate
languages in their time. Therefore, even twenty-five years after
independence, our government, our universities, and our
intellectuals insist on treating them as two separate and
independent languages. Pakistan radio goes on ruining the beauty
of this language by thrusting into it as many Persian and Arabic
words as possible; and All India Radio knocks it out of all shape
by pouring the entire Sanskrit dictionary into it................
My film colleague Johnny Walker remarked the other day, "They
should not announce 'Ab Hindi mein samachar suniye' they should
say, 'Ab Samachar mein Hindi suniye.' "
3. "That is why a lot of hoo-haw is made about Hindi as the
Rashtrabhasha. They know very well that this Sanskrit-laden,
artificial language, deprived of all modern scientific and
technical terms, is too weak and insipid to challenge the
supremacy of English. It will always remain a show piece, and
what is more, a convenient tool to keep the masses fighting among
themselves."
4. "
"But why the Roman script?" my friend asked.
"Because no one has any prejudice against it," I said. "It is
the only script which has already gained all-India currency.
In north, south, east and west, you can see shop signs and
film posters in this script. We use this script for writing
addresses on envelopes and post cards. The army has been using
it for the last thirty years at least."
5. "
"Comrade, Esperanto is just that Rashtrabhasha which the Hindi
Pandits are manufacturing in their studies, from the pages of
some Sanskrit dictionary."
Some of the logic and conclusions of Balraj Sahni can perhaps be
disputed, but this is not the place or occasion to do it.
But, basically, you can see for yourself what he has had to say
about the Hindi language.
Also, he is talking of a "Hindustani" language, which contains words
like "fooltroo" etc. Whether such a language can also be a literary
language is open to question. It may be a "register' that is under-
stood by the labour class in a socialist society, but whether they
would also be equally interested in and able to understand the works
of Ghalib, Iqbal, Khwaaja Meer Dard, Meer Taqi Meer, Momin, Faani
Badayuni, Hasrat Mohani etc. on the one hand --- and also the
writings of Jayashankar Prasad, Suryakant Tripathi Nirala, Mahadevi
Verma, Maithilisharan Gupt, Ramdhari Singh Dinkar, Harivanshrai
Bachchan etc. on the other, is something that needs to be examined
in detail. One has to see whether the writings of all these people
can legitimately be regarded as being in the so-called "Hindustani"
language. Or should we keep "Literature" entirely out of the
purview of our discussions ?
And there is one very important point that, seemingly, has not
received your due attention. Balraj Sahni is talking only about a
"simple" language. But he is in favour of retention and continued
use of the Roman script, "because nobody has any prejudice against
it".
You have stated in another post that we need not look at our (i.e.
Indian) Constitution to determine the existence of the "Hindustani"
language. I would say : "Why flog a dead horse" ? It isn't as if
this question was not before our leaders in the period before
Partition. While Hindi fanatics like Dhulekar, P.D. Tandon etc.
were in the forefront against "Hindustani", saner elements like
Jawaharlal Nehru and Mahatma Gandhi did try to build a political
consensus in favour of "Hindustani". But it was all to no avail.
I will quote an extract from a newpaper report :
" Partition more-or-less killed the case for Hindustani. The move to
further Sanskritise Hindi gathered pace. One can see this at work
in the Constituent Assembly, where early references were to
Hindustani, but later references all to Hindi. After the division
of the country, the promoters of Hindi became even more fanatical.
As Granville Austin observes, "The Hindi-wallahs were ready to
risk splitting the Assembly and the country in their unreasoning
pursuit of uniformity." Their crusade provoked some of the most
heated debates in the House. Hindustani would not have been
acceptable to South Indians; Hindi, even less so. Whenever a
member spoke in Hindi, another member would ask for a translation
into English. When the case was made for Hindi to be the sole
national language, it was bitterly opposed."
During the Hindi Vs. Hindustani Debate, T.T. Krishnamachari spoke
as under :
"(I)f we are going to be compelled to learn Hindi ... I would
perhaps not to be able to do it because of my age, and perhaps
I would not be willing to do it because of the amount of
constraint you put on me. ... This kind of intolerance makes
us fear that the strong Centre which we need, a strong Centre
which is necessary, will also mean the enslavement of people
who do not speak the language of the Centre. I would, Sir,
convey a warning on behalf of people of the South for the
reason that there are already elements in South India who want
separation... ., and my honourable friends in U.P. do not help
us in any way by flogging their idea (of) `Hindi Imperialism'
to the maximum extent possible. Sir, it is up to my friends in
U.P. to have a whole-India; it is up to them to have a
Hindi-India. The choice is theirs... ."
I do not wish to belabour this point any further. Suffice it to
say that the fanatical intolerance of the Hindi-proponents and a
desire for linguistic hegemony killed any prospect "Hindustani"
might have had for adoption as the national language.
It is now immaterial if a few individuals (like UVR or Prem Joshi)
want to resurrect the issue. Whether the language exists or not
is equally irrelevant.
As I have said all along, Urdu-wallahs have not tried to have
the Hindi language shed its Sanskrit influence. If Hindi -
wallahs are happy with their "AakashVaani Samachar", so be it.
It is always the other side which keeps on trying to have the
Urdu language "diluted". And I don't understand why. It isn't
as if Arabic, Persian, Turkish words were not being used in
Urdu, say, 100 years back. It isn't as if these have been
introduced and incorporated in the language only recently or,
say, since 1947.
You have referred to a Hindi prose sentence I wrote and then
contrasted it with Ghalib's sher. Take the following brief
sentence :
MaiN Dehli ja raha hooN
One can write it in the Urdu script or the D. script. Now, if
someone asks : Is this in Urdu, or Hindi (or perhaps) in the
Hindustani language ? Will this be a fair question ?
Certainly not. Everybody knows about the elements common to
both languages (Urdu and Hindi).
Now take one example from your own post in another recent thread
{Farhat Shehzad Ki Ghazal} where you have tried to explain that
the usage "sar-har-e-KHaar" is correct. (It is.) And you have
quoted two verses of Ghalib to prove your point :
daam-e-har mauj meN hai halqa-e-sad kaam-e-nahang
dekheN kyaa guzre hai qatre pe guhar hone tak (hote tak)
shab k woh majlis firoz-e-Khilwat-e-naamoos thaa
rishta-e-har sham'a Khaar-e-kiswat-e-faanoos thaa
Would you say that these verses are in Hindi ?
UVR Saheb, "Banti naheeN hai baada(h)-o-saaGhar kahe baGHair !
You have also quoted a sher by Ahmed Faraz :
tuu ne dekhi hi naheeN dasht-e-wafaa ki tasweer
nok-e-har Khaar pe ik qatra-e-KhooN hai, yooN hai
This is a fine ghazal by the late poet. But, see what happens
if someone tries to write it in Roman -- someone who is not quite
familiar with the Urdu language and its script :
Us Ka Apna Hee Karismaa Hai,Fasoon Hai, ! Yoon Hai !
Yoon To Kehnay Ko Sabhi Kehtay Hain, !Yoon Hai!Yoon Hai !
Jaisay Koi Dar'ray Dil par Ho Sa'Ta'za Kab Say
Ak Sayaa Na Daa'roon Hai Na Baa'roon Hai, !Yoon Hai !
Tum Ne Daikhee Hee Nahi Dashtt'Te'Wafa Ki Tasveer
Nouk'Kay'Haar'Kha'aar Par Qatraa Khoon Hai, ! Yoon Hai !
Ab Tum Ayee Ho Meri Jaan Tama'Shah Karne
Ab To Daryaa Main Talaa'tum Na Sakoon Hai, !Yoon Hai !
Na'sai'aab Tujh Ko Khabar Kya K Muhabbat Kya Hai..?
Tu Rooz Ajata Hai Samjhaata Hai, !Yoon Hai Yoon Hai !
Shayee'ree Taza Zamanoon Ki Hai Maa'maar FARAZ
Yeh B Ak Silseela Qun'Fay'Kiyun Hai, !Yoon Hai Yoon Hai !
(The transcriber is one Imran)
I am sure you will be able to locate the URL.
In our zeal for finding an easy way-out, do we have to adopt this
sort of a script ? Whatever system (in Roman script) we may adopt
for transcribing Urdu writing, accuracy is something that cannot be
ignored or eschewed. It s for this reason that I have had some
opposition to iTrans, the system that is followed in the music
group RMIM. Again, I do not wish to bring our long debates on this
subject in our discussions here. But, to make ALUPers see what I
am talking about, here is the iTrans transcript of a film song from
"Bahu Begum" :
araz\-e\-shauq aa.Nkho.n me.n hai, araz\-e\-vafaa aa.Nkho.n me.n hai
tere aage baat kahane kaa mazaa aa.Nkho.n me.n hai
vaaqif huu.N khuub ishq ke tarz\-e\-bayaa.N se mai.n
kah duu.Ngaa dil kii baat nazar kii zubaa.N se mai.n \-2
merii vafaa kaa shauq se tuu imtahaan le
guzaruu.nga tere ishq me.n har imtahaa.N se mai.n
vaaqif huu.N khuub ishq\threedots
ai husn\-e\-aashanaa tere jalavo.n kii khair ho
be\-gaana ho gayaa huu.N Gam\-e\-do jahaa.N se mai.n
Part-II
ab jaa.n\-b\-lab huu.N shiddat\-e\-dard\-e\-nihaa.N se mai.n
aise me.n tujh ko Dhuu.NDh kar laauu.N kahaa.N se mai.n
zamii.n hamdard hai merii na hamadam aasamaa.n meraa
teraa dar chhuuT gayaa to phir Thikaanaa hai kahaa.N meraa
qasam hai tujh ko, tujh ko qasam hai,
jazbaa\-e\-dil na jaaye raigaa.N meraa
yahii hai imtahaa.N teraa, yahii hai imtahaa.n meraa
ek simT muhabbat hai ek simT zamaanaa
ab aise me.n tujh ko Dhuu.NDh kar laauu.N kahaa.N se mai.n
teraa Kayaal terii tamannaa liye hue
dil bujh rahaa hai aas kaa sholaa liye hue
hairaa.N kha.Dii huii hai doraahe pe zi.ndagii
naakaam hasarato.n kaa janaazaa liye hue
ab aise me.n tujh ko Dhuu.NDh kar laauu.N kahaa.N se mai.n
aavaaz de rahaa hai dil\-e\-Kaanamaa.n Karaab
siine me.n iztaraab hai saa.Nso.n me.n pech\-o\-taab
ai ruuh\-e\-ishq ai jaan\-e\-vafaa kuch to de javaab
ab jaa.n-b-lab huu.N shiddat\-e\-dard\-e\-nihaa.N se mai.n
aise me.n tujh ko Dhuu.NDh kar laauu.N kahaa.N se mai.n
Nobody ever said that the kind of vocabulary Ghalib used in his
"difficult" poetry is the ONLY acceptable form of Urdu. He had
his detractors in his own time --- and they were all Urdu-speaking
people, not Hindi-wallahs. But that is ALSO Urdu in its own way.
If Daagh uses a much simpler vocabulary, that is HIS style. And
that too is Urdu. Can we compel any man of letters to write in a
style or use a "register" that conforms to our own sensibilities ?
If someone is not happy with how Ghalib or Iqbal or Faani write
their poetry, nobody compels them to pore over these poets'
works.
Also, the fact remains that nobody can ever claim that Jigar,
Hasrat, Faani, Faiz, Ahmed Faraz etc. were NOT Urdu poets. To my
knowledge, nobody has ever called them Hindi poets.
You say : "On the other side of the 'coin', a number
of Farsi/Arabic words can be found in the works of Hindi kavis of
all ages." I am glad to learn this. Maybe you will quote some of
their poetry. Perhaps, this is also a case of
Banti naheeN hai baada(h)-o-saaGHar kahe baGHair
You have quoted a film song : "Jeevan se bhari teri aaNkheN". This
is like the sentence I cited earlier : "MaiN Dehli ja raha hooN".
Why should we pinpoint this as either Urdu or Hindi ? The lyrics
used in Indian films should preferably be called "Filmi Poetry".
If "MuGHal-e-Aazam" can be a Hindi film, arguments of this nature
carry no conviction.
You ask : "What about the language the average Allahabad-wallah or
Lucknow-wallah speaks ?" I say : let them speak whatever dialect
or language they wish to speak. What we are concerned with here is
Urdu Literature (particularly Urdu Poetry). I don't think any of
the Urdu poets I have named in a preceding paragraph have ever used
the Allahabad-wallah or Lucknow-wallah type of spoken language in
their poetry. The average London cockney does not speak the kind
of language Milton, Keats or Browning used in their poetry.
Will the Heavens of Hindi fall if Urdu poets continued to use words
like "zeest" or "nigah-e-naaz" ?
I don't quite understand the need for a "different approach". I am
sure Hindi-wallahs are happy in writing and reading Hindi poetry.
I am equally sure that Urdu-wallahs are also quite happy and
content with reading Ghalib, Iqbal, Nasir Kazimi and Ahmed Faraz
etc. So why not "live and let live" ?
And whoever talked about supplanting the D. script, as you assert ?
No Urdu-wallah is interested in that. In fact, the D. script is
in the fortunate situation where it can be used readily on the
computer. On the contrary, we always hear talk about doing away
with the Urdu script. People keep on saying that Urdu's future
lies in adopting the D. script. This is an argument that genuine
Urdu lovers neither appreciate nor even understand.
About 20 months back, we had a thread started by someone called
Piyush : "Ab Urdu Websites Ko Hindi Men Padho". Those who might
not have seen that thread can search the archives. It was some -
time in June 2007. This was an outlandish idea for an Urdu
Newsgroup. Why should anybody familiar with Urdu wish to read an
Urdu website in Hindi ? Ostensibly, the idea was to bring the two
"sides" nearer to each other. But, subsequently, the truth did
come out that the real motive was to strike a blow against Urdu,
which the Original Poster called an "impure" language, spoken and
used by an "impure" people. Urdu lovers cannot understand why
such hurtful attempts continue to be made.
And why should any Urdu lover want to write Urdu in the Hindi or
Devanagri script ? We have a perfectly fine script of our own that
has been in continuous use for ages. We are comfortable with it.
For now, maybe, we have to use Roman script on the computer. We
are comfortable with that too. If giving up our script is the
price we have to pay for "gaining" the 'love' of Hindi-wallahs,
we are perhaps better off without such "love".
If a non-Urdu person happens to "fall in love" with the Urdu lang-
uage, can we not expect him to learn the basics of the language,
its grammar, vocabulary, script and other nuances ? If such a
person finds it difficult , should he start demanding short-cuts
and easy-way-outs ? Is abandonment of the Urdu script and a
thorough, intensive and exhaustive dilution of its vocabulary
the only way to help such people ? If this is so, the conclusion
is inescapable that such love is absolutely fake.
Most people in the latter part of the nineteenth century and the
early decades of the twentieth century were completely familiar
with the Urdu language and wrote extensively in it --- even though
they did not belong to the minority community. I have myself read
their writings and posted their poetry in our Newsgroup. The idea
was to convince "non-believers" (no pun here) that Urdu was not
exclusively the language of Muslims alone. {And I can renew that
exercise.} If those folks in the earlier era could do it, why
can't the modern generation do the same, aided (as it is) by the
quantum leap in technology advancement ?
Afzal
UVR
wrote:
Minor correction to a small part near the end. Premchand writes:
... jis tarah aNgrezoN ki bhaashaa aNgrezi, Japan ki jaapaani, Iran ki
iiraani (!) aur cheen ki cheeni hai, usee prakaar Hindustaan ki
rashtreeya bhaashaa ko isee taur par Hindustani kahna keval uchit hi
naheeN, bal.k aavashyak bhi hai. aur agar is desh ko Hindustan na kah
kar kevel hind kaheN to iski bhaashaa ko Hindi kah sakte haiN. lekin
yahaaN ki bhaashaa ko Urdu to kisee prakaar kahaa hi naheeN jaa
saktaa, jab tak ham Hindustan ko Urduustan na kahne lageN, jo ab kisee
prakaar sambhav hi naheeN hai. praacheen kaal ke log yahaaN ki
bhaashaa ko Hindi hi kahte the.
That notwithstanding, it is my pleasured duty to thank you for your
help in transliterating Premchand's Nagari text into Roman, RC
saahib. Please accept my gratitude.
-UVR.
UVR
Naseer saahib,
You could well be right about Hindko.
As for the other point, I think it's a big mistake to believe that a
common language "never took root." But I will wait to elaborate on
this until Afzal Khan saahib has had his say. All I'll say is that
the common language is NOT the language from Premchand's article.
It's closer to the language you've heard in Hindi films and which you
think is Urdu and your Hindi friends insist is Hindi.
BTW, if you heard Urdu spoken in Hindi films, did it not make you
wonder what language was spoken in the "Hindi"-belt?
-UVR.
Naseer
On Jan 21, 8:02 pm, UVR <u...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> On Jan 20, 4:21 pm, "Afzal A. Khan" <me_af...@invalid.invalid> wrote:
>
>
>
> > And it is not merely a question of script alone. The language
> > itself is very important. Let us examine the following prose
> > sentence :
>
> > "Jeevan ke dukhoN ka aNt to kewal mrityu se hi sambhav hai.
> > Dekho na --- mom batti ko bhor hone tak jalna hi
> > paRta hai."
>
> > It may be possible to put this idea in verse form. But the
> > language is certainly not Urdu, as we know it.
>
> So, what if we said:
>
> jeevan ke dukhoN kaa ant sirf maut se ho saktaa hai. diye ko saveraa
> hone tak jalna hi paRtaa hai.
>
> Is this Urdu? What about the lines "jeevan se bhari teri aaNkheN
> majboor kareN jeene ke liye"? After all, Urdu poets of some repute
> have been using the words 'jeevan', 'dukh' etc in their poetry and
> calling it Urdu poetry and nobody has objected.
I don't really wish to steal Afzal Sahib's "show" so to speak but I
would like to say a few words on this topic.
I believe you have to take the whole sentence and not necessarily
disect it into its component parts.
"Jeevan ke dukhoN ka aNt to kewal mrityu se hi sambhav hai.Dekho na
--- mom batti ko bhor hone tak jalna hi paRta hai."
Once you asked me if I considered the word "niDar" as Urdu and here
again I believe you are falling into the same trap. What one needs to
ask is whether words like "niDar", "dukh" are regularly used by Urdu
speakers in their speech and writing or not. I believe the answer is
yes. The second type of words are "darpan", "darshan" "ant" "bhor"etc,
which may be used by poets in specific backdrops, for example the poem
"Jogi", but they would not be used by Urdu speakers as a rule. I would
say that they would naturally use "aa'iina", "diidar", anjaam and
saHar . The third category would have words like "yadi, prantu, kintu,
keval, mrityu, sambhav. I believe Urdu speakers would never use these
in their speech or writings. You might find solitary examples and
prove me wrong but I hope you follow my line of thought. Even though
you did not tell ALUPers what in your view defines Urdu and Hindi, I
am sure you would agree that the sentence quoted by Afzal Sahib, even
with the lonely "mom" is NOT Urdu.
"jeevan ke dukhoN kaa ant sirf maut se ho saktaa hai. diye ko saveraa
hone tak jalna hi paRtaa hai."
An Urdu speaker would not, as a matter of course, include the word
"ant" in this sentence. "anjaam" would be the more natural choice.
"jeevan se bhari teri aaNkheN majboor kareN jeene ke liye"?
I would put this sentence under the category of Urdu with an
improvisor. An Urdu speaker, instinctively, would say "zindagii se
bharii terii aaNkheN majbuur kareN jeene ke liye".
I think there is an important point which must not be ignored. No one
is born with an inherent hatred for a particular word or words. If I
grew up listening to words such as "yadi, prantu, kintu, keval,
mrityu, sambhav.." in the speech of my loved ones, friends, the local
media and read them in my school and college books, they would form
part of my language. In my case, I never grew up with such words. So,
even I forced my self to say " UVR jii, yadi aap apne mukh ko darpan
meN dekheN ge to turant aap kii mrityu ho jaa'e gii!!:)", it would be
totally false and contrived. One further point, Urdu speakers living
in India, since they are exposed to Sanskitized language in books and
media are more likely to use some of these words in their speech and
writings then those like me, Zafar Sahib and Jamil Sahib.
I have no idea about the Lakhnavi Hindi speaker and Allahabadi Urdu-
vaalaas, but I do agree that there are different registers in any
language and Urdu is no different. Ghalib was a product of his era and
this is reflected in his poetry.
> What I'm saying is that as practitioners of Urdu or Hindi, we should
> not allow ourselves to get carried away and adopt a "Hindi vs. Urdu"
> attitude. When the Heavens of Urdu didn't come crumbling down by Faiz
> saying "aur bhi dukh haiN zamaane meN muhabbat ke siwaa", why should
> they crash if someone else uses "jiivan" instead of "zindagii" or
> "ziist", or even "darpan" or "darshan" versus "aa'eena" or "deed".
> And vice versa for Hindi kavitaa?
I believe I have covered this point above.
> Many long decades of isolation and insulation have passed with both
> Hindi- and Urdu-wallahs pointing to this, that and the other and
> declaring "this is not Hindi" or "this cannot be Urdu". We can
> plainly see where it has gotten us. Maybe it's time to try a
> different approach.
> PS: By a "different approach" I *DO NOT* mean supplanting the Urdu
> script and Devanagari and replacing them with some form of a Roman
> substitute. I do not support that point of view at all. But maybe,
> for example, we could be a little less antagonistic to someone who
> wants to write Urdu in the Hindi script. Or vice versa. If that's
> how Hindi-wallahs will fall in love with Urdu, or Urdu-wallahs with
> Hindi, I think it's completely worth it.
I think that the approach which needs to be taken is that of mutual
respect and co-existence rather than forced assimilation. Urdu
speakers are quite content with the language and its script. If some
one wishes to write Urdu in Devanagri or Cyrillic, so be it. This is
their choice. I don't think they will begin to love each other's
language by writing in each other's scripts. What will bring the
people together if they accept each other for what they are and not
impose on any one group their wishes and desires. It has never
occurred to me to write an article entitled "Hindi ko Urdu meN
paRho!".
KHair-andesh,
Naseer
UVR
Afzal saahib,
With all due respect and humility I must state that you have fully
misunderstood the point of my post. Whether this is due to my own
inability to convey my ideas or something else, it does not matter.
The gist of my post was this, "why must we (Urdu wallahs and Hindi
wallahs alike) always keep harping on the differences between Hindi
and Urdu? Why can't we open our hearts and minds to accepting words
from 'the other' language as our own? Won't a richer vocabulary
result from such acceptance?"
It's not like Hindi will cease to remain Hindi if a thousand Hindi
wallahs start using the word "zeest" in their conversational and
literary lives. Nor will the 'wujood' of Urdu be threatened even if a
hundred literateurs used the word "mrityu" in their poetry as well as
using "maut". Is there some specific reason only Hindi is supposed to
accept Sanskrit words? Is there an issue with Urdu adopting Sanskrit
words also *in addition to* (note: NOT 'in lieu of') Farsi and Arabic
words?
You have said several times in the past that Urdu is not just a
language, but a representative of an entire tehzeeb. I don't disagree
with that proposition at all. But let me ask you this, and pointedly:
is the tehzeeb of Urdu so feeble and weak that including the word
"mrityu" or "sundartaa" in its language will cause serious problems?
Anyway, I will not belabor this issue any more. I believe I have made
my point in the clearest manner my abilities will allow. If you and I
must disagree on this, so be it.
About the abandonment of the Urdu script -- I have unequivocally
stated that I am not in favor of any such silly idea. My intent in
posting the Balraj Sahni link was simply to bring to ALUPers' notice
something that I found interesting. It would be a grave error to
think that everything I find interesting or share with ALUP is
something I agree with or approve of!
However, I'm not against the use of Roman for Hindi and Urdu or
against Devanagari for Urdu. That there are a few insufficiencies
currently in the available transliteration methods does not say to me
that we must abandon all attempts to find satisfactory solutions.
Regarding "Hindustani," let's leave it to language scholars and
researchers, but not to constitutions, to decide whether such a
language (or dialect, if you will) exists or not. A Constitution has
no business telling us what languages are "real" and what aren't.
-UVR.
UVR
Thank you for your response. I believe in my previous posts I have
already responded to all the points you have made.
On Jan 22, 2:23 pm, Naseer <qures...@googlemail.com> wrote:
>
> I think that the approach which needs to be taken is that of mutual
> respect and co-existence rather than forced assimilation. Urdu
> speakers are quite content with the language and its script. If some
> one wishes to write Urdu in Devanagri or Cyrillic, so be it. This is
> their choice. I don't think they will begin to love each other's
> language by writing in each other's scripts. What will bring the
> people together if they accept each other for what they are and not
> impose on any one group their wishes and desires. It has never
> occurred to me to write an article entitled "Hindi ko Urdu meN
> paRho!".
>
> KHair-andesh,
> Naseer
That mutual respect must exist is a foregone conclusion.
I never suggested forced assimilation. But what Urdu and Hindi have
practiced for a long time is deliberate exclusion. The results of
that practice can be seen in almost every Urdu-Hindi discussion you
and I, or Afzal saahib and I, have engaged in.
As you point out in a portion of your post, a young (say 21-year old)
Urdu speaker from India today may have absolutely no problem
understanding the sentence "mere paas is bahs ke liye samay naheeN
hai" OR "dukh aur sukh ek hi sikke ke do pahloo haiN" OR "jeevan kaa
ant mrityu hai", etc. There will even be some who instinctively use
'samay' or the 'jeevan-mrityu' doublet because they've grown up
imbibing such vocabulary. But STILL, when these selfsame people
consciously "speak in Urdu", they will deliberately exclude samay,
mrityu, ant etc, under the pretext that these are not "Urdu" words --
or so they have been taught! The same way, there's no dearth of Hindi
speakers who will say "prashansaneeya" just to make a point, even if
their natural instinct is to use "qaabil-e-ta'areef"[1]
It's high time we put a stop to this kind of deliberate exclusion. In
both Hindi and Urdu. Let people use "kintu, parantul" etc in Urdu if
they want. Or "mehmaan nawaazi" in Hindi instead of "atithi
satkaar". What exactly is the disaster we're seeking to avoid?
-UVR.
PS: Some fools say "taareef-e-kaabil" (sic), but they are not our
concern.
Naseer
On Jan 22, 6:02 pm, UVR <u...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> On Jan 22, 4:09 am, Naseer <qures...@googlemail.com> wrote:
> > janaab-i-UVR Sahib, aadaab 'arz hai.
>
> > I must admit, I am absolutely amazed at the
> > number of people who speak (write) in defence of Hindi and the
> > frequency at which this phenomenon takes place in ALUP. I wonder how
> > often this kind of debate takes place in alt.hindi-- -- group. My own
> > feeling can be summarised in one of my posts in this thread and that
> > was simply saying "let us agree to disagree". However, it seems,, this
> > Urdu/Hindi debate will outlive all of us!!
>
> > It is obvious that there is a certain amount of confusion in people's
> > minds as to what constitutes literary Urdu and what are the
> > ingredients of literary Hindi. In one of your older posts you asked
> > what the word for "definition" was in Urdu. I believe Raj Kumar Sahib
> > explained that the best translation would be "ta'riif".
>
> > As you are 'at home"in both Urdu and Hindi and perhaps even more so
> > than your mother tongue and the well-known fact that your scholarly
> > knowledge in linguistics and poetry of these languages and beyond
> > outstrips most of us mortals, I am sure ALUPers would welcome your
> > "ta'riif" of both Urdu and Hindi. To the best of my knowledge, I am
> > not sure if you have spelled out your stance on this subject in clear,
> > unambiguous terms.
> Specifically, in my response to Afzal sb's post, what I have said is
> that we Urdu wallahs NEED NOT adopt an antagonistic pose towards so-
> called "Hindi" words -- for such a posture is evident much as we may
> want to deny it -- nor should Hindi wallahs do so with purported
> "Urdu" words. What's the harm, really, if Urdu poets start using more
> Hindi or even Sanskrit words, and what's the harm if Hindi kavis
> employ Farsi words?
At the risk of repeating myself, what I am saying is from an Urdu
speaker's perspective. I can not envisage the Hindi speaker's psyche
as I have not had the occasion to live in such an environment. I do
not believe that Urdu valaas, as you put it, adopt an antagonistic
pose towards words which may be construed as Hindi. I have already
attempted to explain the three layered structure of such words. One
needs to be part of that "language/culture/education" background in
order to use the type of vocabulary you have in mind. If all my life I
have been listening to and writing such words as "dil", "vaqt"
"zindagii", "maut", I am not suddenly going to substitute hrday,
samay, jeevan, mrityu when I am talking to you, assuming I know these
words, am I? In fact, I won't even use qalb, zamaan and Hayaat in
ordinary speech. If I am using agar/magar/lekin habitually, why would
I begin to use yadi/kintu/parantu etc? I wonder how many of the living
Urdu poets would be able to understand Prem Chand's sample of his
hopes and aspirations unless one has studied High Hindi or Sanskrit? I
am not aware if the words of mrityu kind have ever been used by Urdu
writers. jiivan-maran yes, but not jiivan-mrityu. The only natural way
for Urdu writers to use such words would be if these words come
naturally to them. So, in summary, there is no harm from either side.
But, it needs to happen instictively, not to employ such words for
their sake only.
When Faiz said..
awr bhii dukh haiN zamaane meM muHabbat ke sivaa
it is the most natural way for an Urdu writer to express this idea.
Had he written..
awr bhii dukh haiN samay/kaal meN prem ko chhoR ke
everyone would have questioned his choice of words.
> I mean, if Hindi can accept the *as-is* borrowing of an unlimited
> number of words from Sanskrit, why can't it accept the same from
> Persian? And if Urdu can get *as-is* an unlimited number of Persian
> words, why not an unlimited number of Sanskrit words as-is? No,
> seriously, WHAT is preventing this?
I have, I believe, answered this above from the Urdu perspective. I
can not say why Hindi writers and speakers can not accept Arabic and
Persian. Perhaps there is a fear that return of such words back into
the language would turn it into Urdu once more.
If there's no problem in writing
> Hindi in the Roman script if the conditions demand it, why is there a
> problem in writing it in Nast'aliq? And in writing Urdu in
> Devanagari?
Why would an Hindi writer wish to use Urdu script for his kavita?
Conversely, why would, say, Raj Kumar Sahib wish to write his Urdu
poetry in Devanagri, when the Urdu script he uses has been performing
efficiently for centuries? The only reason I can think of when this
would make sense is if the writer wishes a wider readership and have
his work printed in the other script. But the writer will write only
in the script of his language.
> As for giving a definition of Hindi and/or Urdu, I will respectfully
> demur. This is perhaps an even more emotionally charged issue than
> the "ahl-e-zabaan" matter. When someone as knowledgeable and
> experienced as Afzal saahib can stay mum on the one, an ignorant
> fledgling like me can surely hold my peace on the other.
kaash kih mujhe kabhii ek siidhe saade savaal kaa siidhaa-saadah
javaab mil jaataa! Why do you need to follow Afzal Sahib's example?
You must have your views on the question I have posed. What is
stopping you from expressing them? But I am living in cloud-cuckoo
land!
KHair-andesh,
Naseer
Afzal A. Khan
>> UVR wrote:
UVR Saheb,
I am surprised at the turn you have given to your arguments.
I had tried to deal with ALL the points you had raised earlier,
even at the expense of making my rejoinder so long. You can
readily imagine the time and effort it must have taken me to
type and post my rejoinder. I didn't (and don't) grudge it one
bit, though. Anything for a noble cause and all that. And
putting in some efforts in defending one's own language and its
script is indeed a noble cause.
I am surprised because now you tell me that I have "fully
misunderstood" the point of your post ! I would let Naseer
Saheb and other ALUPers decide whether I am indeed that much
of an ignoramus, who cannot even follow a "simple" line of
reasoning (yours, that is).
About Balraj Sahni's link : You say that you "merely" found it
"interesting", but (in all probability) you didn't agree with or
approve of what he had said. The portions of his Address that
are relevant for our discussion here deal with the "Hindustani"
language and its transcription in Roman script. Are you now
telling us that you don't approve of the "Hindustani" language ?
You are quite willing to castigate our own (i.e the Indian)
Constitution : it has no right to tell us whether any "Hindus-
tani" language exists or not. If Shri UVR or Prem Joshi (and a
few others of their ilk) think it exists, then surely it exists !
And, what is more, Urdu-wallahs and ALUPers must also accept and
recognize this !
Surely, it didn't escape your notice that I didn't respond at all
to your first post, sending the Balraj Sahni link. I didn't
really feel that it needed to be commented upon. But the core
issue in our subsequent discussions here was the turn Prem Joshi
gave to this subject, bringing in the Urdu-Hindi imbroglio,
accusations about "political correctness" and also the name of our
neighbouring country. He also alleged that a sustained campaign
had been going on for about 60 years or so to systematically
remove all Hindi words from the Urdu language. I have been
reading Urdu books and magazines for a period much longer than
that. In my Library (back in India), I have Urdu books and
magazines that were printed and published in the nineteenth and
early twentieth century. And I can even quote passages from these
books/magazines to demonstrate that the Urdu language used then is
essentially and intrinsically the same that is used these days.
I did post a suitable rejoinder to Prem Joshi's fulminations.
Even Naseer Saheb was at a loss to understand the cause for his
displeasure and anger.
And then you jumped into the discussion. Pardon me for thinking
that you are in the (fortunate ?) position of "running with the
hares " and also "hunting with the hounds".
I can perhaps summarize your (latest or amended) line of thinking
as under :
"Why can't Urdu-wallahs and Hindi-wallahs open their hearts and
minds to accepting words from the "other" language as their own ?
Won't a richer vocabulary result from such acceptance ? Hindi
will still remain Hindi even if a thousand Hindi-wallahs start
using the word "zeest" in their conversational and literary lives.
Conversely, the "wujood" of Urdu will not be threatened even if a
hundred literateurs used the word "mrityu" in their poetry (in
addition to "maut"). Why should Hindi alone accept words from
Sanskrit ? Why can't Urdu adopt Sanskrit words also, in addition
to Arabic and Farsi words ? Is the 'tehzeeb' of Urdu so weak or
feeble that inclusion of words like "mrityu" and "sundarta" cause
any problems ?"
UVR Saheb, please inform us (i.e. ALUPers) which Hindi Newsgroups
do you regularly visit. And if there are any, please let us know
whether you have advocated this approach there. Please do make
these suggestions (that Hindi should start using Arabic and Farsi
words as part of its everyday vocabulary) and see the reaction of
the Hindi-wallahs. We would all be interested in finding out
whether their Hindi-sabhyata would induce them to ponder over your
ideas in a serious and unbiased manner.
UVR Saheb, when these die-hards couldn't even stomach the idea of
a "Hindustani" language (and that too, in the teeth of its
advocacy by the likes of Gandhiji and Pandit Nehru), do you
honestly feel that these folks would take kindly to your ideas ?
Or are your suggestions meant only for the Urdu lovers
alone; and the quid pro quo, of Hindi-wallahs doing something
similar, merely flung into the ring as a "red herring" ?
Honestly, do you really believe that Hindi-wallahs would readily
agree to use words like "zeest", "marg", "taGHaaful" etc. in
their everyday conversation ? Conversely, you are demanding
that modern-day and future Urdu poets should first learn addi-
tional Sanskrit words and then use them in their poetry. Have
you really thought as to how this strange amalgam of Farsi,
Arabic and Sanskrit would read like ? UVR Saheb, if such an
amalgamation were really feasible, I am sure many others would
have already thought about it. And before poets start using
this sort of amalgam, the language itself has to change. A
new-fangled language has to emerge and Urdu-speaking people
have to learn it and accept it and then alone today's Urdu
poets (or those of the future) would be able to use it. And,
before you say : "why not ?", such a language has to be accepted
and learnt by the non-Urdu folks too. Do you sincerely believe
that this will be acceptable to the Hindi-diehards ?
You have put forward a facile argument that "Urdu would not cease
to be Urdu" by adopting Sanskrit words. Let me tell you, quite
frankly, that this argument does not wash; it does not hold water.
Urdu-wallahs are not so dumb that they would readily swallow this
bait. What you are really demanding is that Urdu should amal-
gamate itself with Sanskriticised Hindi. In other words, it
should stangle itself and commit suicide, by assimilating itself
with "this Sanskrit-laden, artificial language", as Balraj Sahni
put it.
You say you are not in favour of abandoning the Urdu script. But
can you deny that quite a few people have been advocating this
"very silly idea" (as you put it), in our Newsgroup ? And this
has been happening at periodical intervals. And now you have
revealed, or perhaps reiterated, another facet of your thinking.
You now admit that "there are a few insufficiencies currently, in
the available transliteration methods." {If you are including
iTrans too in this generalization, we Urdu-wallahs ought to be
thankful for such small mercies.}
But then you are back in your groove : that attempts to find
satisfactory solutions must continue apace.
What you essentially mean is that you are not happy with the
transliteration schemes (in Roman) that ordinary mortals like
Yours Truly use in ALUP or RMIM. Also, you are not happy with
the elaborate system devised by Sarwar Alam Saheb. What other
"satisfactory" solutions do you have in mind ? Are you your-
self engaged in devising some Software for this purpose ? Is
someone else engaged in this exercise, to your knowledge ?
When you bring up the question of "satisfactory solutions", you
are sort of betraying a feeling that the present transliteration
methods we follow in ALUP are NOT satisfactory and should be
given up. Why talk about this absurd "necessity" for change, when
no acceptable alternative is in sight ? Or are you thinking of
substituting the present system with, say, iTrans ? And what
exactly do you mean by saying that "you are not against Devanagri
for Urdu" ? Does this not contradict your earlier assertion that
you are not in favour of abandoning the Urdu script ?
Why can't we just "live and let live" ? What beef do you have
with this "sulh-e-kul" approach ?
Afzal
Naseer
On Jan 16, 5:57 pm, "nageshsa...@yahoo.com"
<Srinageshfam...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Dr. Zakir Huaain goes on to cite several couplets and excerpts from
> letters in his discussion. I will present a few excerpts in this
> post.
> main bani aadam ko musalmaan ya hindu ya nasraani azeez rakhta huN aur
> apna bhaai ginta huN. doosra maane ya na maane.
One word is missing here Nagesh Sahib. "....musalmaan *ho*yaa......"
> nahin kucch subh-o zunnaar ke phande mein giraaii
> vafaadaari mein shaikh-o barhaman ki aazmaaish hai
The word is "subHah" (rosary).
> kaabe mein jaa raha to na do taanaa kya kaheN
> bhoola hun haq sohbat ahl-e kanisht ko
ka'be meN jaa rahaa, to nah do ta'nah, kyaa *kahiiN*
bhuulaa huuN Haqq-i-suHbat-i-kunisht ko
> urooz-e na umeedi chashm-e zakhm-e charkh kya jaane
> bahaar-e bekhizaan az aah be-taaseer hai paida
'uruuj-i-naa-......."?
> And one Persian sher, transliterated from the Nagri script and
> therefore even more error-filled than the others:
> aagashtaa-e aim har sar-e khaar-e bakhuun-e dil
> kaanoon baghbaanii sahra navishta aim
aaGhashtah-em har sar-i-KHaar-e bah KHuun-i-dil
qaanuun-i-baaGh-baanii-i-saHraa navishtah-em
(ham ne har kaaNTe kii nok ko dil ke lahuu se lat-pat kar diyaa hai.
(yuuN) ham ne qaanuun banaa diyaa hai kih saHraa meN baaGh-baanii kyoN-
kar kii jaa'e.)
KHair-KHvaah,
Naseer
Naseer
discussion in hand.
John.T.Platts, considered by many ALUPers as perhaps the most revered
of lexicographers, wrote his lexicon entitled "A Dictionary of Urdu,
Classical Hindi and English" in 1884. Six years before this, in 1868,
he had already written his grammar bearing the title "A Grammar of the
Hindustani or Urdu Language".
Sushil Sahib has already pointed to Gilchrist using the term "Roman"
for the transcription long time before Balraj Sahni. John Borthwick
Gilchrist was responsible for a number of works including "A
Dictionary, English and Hindoostanee" in 1796 and "A Grammar of the
Hindoostanee Language" (1787-1790). The link below provides full
article on his life and works.
It is obvious to me from the above that the word "Hindustani" used by
the British grammarians and lexicographers was simply another word for
Urdu. In their eyes, the most important and prevelant language of
"Hindustan" was "Hindustani". This word, much later, seems to have
acquired the significance of a "comparamise" language.
Naseer
PremC...@gmail.com
> This is just an additional comment which may be relevent to the
> discussion in hand.
>
> John.T.Platts, considered by many ALUPers as perhaps the most revered
> of lexicographers, wrote his lexicon entitled "A Dictionary of Urdu,
> Classical Hindi and English" in 1884. Six years before this, in 1868,
> he had already written his grammar bearing the title "A Grammar of the
> Hindustani or Urdu Language".
>
> Sushil Sahib has already pointed to Gilchrist using the term "Roman"
> for the transcription long time before Balraj Sahni. John Borthwick
> Gilchrist was responsible for a number of works including "A
> Dictionary, English and Hindoostanee" in 1796 and "A Grammar of the
> Hindoostanee Language" (1787-1790). The link below provides full
> article on his life and works.
>
>
> It is obvious to me from the above that the word "Hindustani" used by
> the British grammarians and lexicographers was simply another word for
> Urdu. In their eyes, the most important and prevelant language of
> "Hindustan" was "Hindustani". This word, much later, seems to have
> acquired the significance of a "comparamise" language.
>
> Naseer
---------------------------------------------------------
Dosto.
I was down with the Flu for the past few days and did not read all the
posts of this subject as they were being posted. But since yesterday
I have slowly and carefully read all the 36 posts. I must say, it has
been a great learning experience. Your love and passion for Urdu is a
source of great encouragement to me. However, I would like to
apologize and rectify a misunderstanding that my posts have created in
the minds of some of my fellow ALUPers. So, Afzal, Naseer and UVR
bhai , I was not angry with any of you for what you have said. For
me, you are my Urdu teachers I didn’t have in my childhood. I love
and respect you with all my heart. My irritation is with Urduwallahs
and Hindiwallahs who, with the power and authority of the state,
decide and define correct Urdu and Hindi. In other words, the language
of TV and Radio news in India and Pakistan is quite different from
what the average person uses in his daily life. Again it is just my
view. I would have preferred the language to be something like the
language of the movie Moghul-e-Azam or at least, like the dramas of
Pakistan TV. However, that was not the reason of my joining this
discussion.
I joined because, I was intrigued by UVR bhai’s post about theuse of
Roman script for Urdu/Hindustani. Since I cant read Urdu properly I
am always looking for Urdu poetry and prose in Roman script like
ITRANS. For example, I get quite excited when I get the opportunity
to read Ghalib’s letters in Roman script. There is so much Urdu
literature that I cannot read. A language develops when people read
write and speak it. Any thing that makes that easier is a step in the
right direction. Hence, I felt like the British, that a suitable Roman
script would go far in keeping Urdu alive for hundreds of years.
Surely we can define the exact pronunciations of the Urdu alphabet by
Roman characters? A better version of ITRANS?
I will end this post with my view of where we are headed in India.
The current spoken language is neither Hindi, nor Urdu. Its
“Hinglish’ Like the name of the movie “Jub we met”, a three word name
of which, two are of English and one of Urdu/Hindi. Characters in
Bollywood movies switch between Hindi and English with full confidence
that their audience is understanding everything. (maybe) In fact some
time ago I read in an article that most Bollywood movie stars use
Roman script to learn their dialogues. (I wish I can get a copy of a
movie script to study their system) Well, the Indian public goes
wherever Bollywood goes. So “Hinglish” in Roman script is the language
future of India. So why not develop a Roman script the includes Urdu
and “Hinglish” pronunciations properly?
Sincerely
PJ
Naseer
wrote:
>
> - Show quoted text -
janaab-i-Prem Joshi Sahib, aadaab.
We in ALUP are pleased to hear that you are on the road to recovery
from your recent encounter with the dreaded flu. I thought you had got
so angry with us that aap ne apnaa boryaa-bistar uThaayaa awr Ghaa'ib
ho ga'e!:) Is this "Eng-duu"?:)
Going back to your request for Roman Urdu. I am not sure if there is
ONE difinitive Roman available. In my own experience of looking at
such books as "Teach Yourself Urdu" and "Teach Yourself Hindi", over
the years the authors appear to have changed their schemes. You will
have noticed that when ALUP-ers do write in Urdu, we all seem to have
our own "styles", though we can read each other's writings without too
much difficulty. So it might be worth your while, if you still feel
that you have the need to follow a system, please look at these kinds
of book in your local library.
At the risk of repeating myself, I would still advise you to persevere
in the script of the language. If you wanted to learn to read English
poetry, would you really want to read it in another script? Here is
what janaab-i-UVR Sahib said to one of the ALUPers in days gone by..
doosri baat -- meri suggestion hai ke aap Urdu paDhna seekh
leN. It may not be an *eaaaaasy* task, but yaqeen maaniye,
it is not as difficult as you might think it is. I know
several non-native Urdu speakers who have learnt to read
the script; some have even done it entirely by themselves.
Perhaps one of the most compelling reasons in favor of learning
to read Urdu is that only a minuscule amount of Urdu literature
is available in English/Devanagari transliteration. For anyone
seriously interested in Urdu poetry, being able to read the script
can be a great asset.
ek Ghazal UVR July 2000
KHair-Khvaah,
Naseer
Jamil
wrote:
> Dosto,
>
> I now realize how politically charged this subject is. A language is a
> means of communication. Nobody can own it. We all know Urdu when we
> hear it and understand it and love it. I am happy that it has been
> given a political identity in Pakistan. But if for political
> correctness they remove Hindi words, Urdu becomes poorer.
>
> PJ
Prem Joshi Sahib
I was wondering how to give a convincing reply to your comments about
Hindi words being deliberately removed from Urdu, when Rajiv
Chakraverti Sahib came to my help and posted Roman transliteration of
Munshi Prem Chand's essay. Here is a writer who achieved great
heights through his writings both in Urdu and Hindi, and reading a
sample of his prose in both languages can tell us a lot about the
difference in the two, at least as reflected by what he wrote nearly a
century ago. I have read some of Munshi Prem Chand's Urdu prose -
most Urdu readers have. All the Hindi words in his Urdu stories are
still being used, and no word has been removed, deliberately or
otherwise. If you are not familiar with any of his Urdu writing, here
are two paragraphs picked at random from his essay "gaaliyaaN"
published more than 70 years ago:
"gaaliyoN se hameN 'ishq sa ho gyaa hai. gaaliyaaN bakne aur sun'ne se
hameN sairii hii nahiiN hoti. Shustah mazaaq hamaare haaN bilkul
ma'duum hai. mazaaq jo kuchh hai vuh gaali galoch peh Khatm ho jaata
hai. ham ne gaaliyaan dene aur sun'ne ke liya rishte muqarrar kar
liye haiN. biivii ka bhaaii, apne behnoii aur behnoii ke dost, dostoN
ke suurat aashnaa aur Tolah muhallah ke har kas o naakas ke liye
yaksaaN taur par fuHsh mazaaq ka nishaana hai. jo hota hai apne hasb-e-
haisiyyat use gaaliyaaN deta hai.
...
"al-qissah, ham chaahe kisii aur baat meN sher hon nah hoN, bad
zabaanii meN ham yagaanah-e-rozgaar haiN. koii qaum is maidaan meN
ham ko niichaa nahiiN dikhaa sakti. yeh maante haiN ke ham meN se
kitne hii ashaab aise haiN jin ki zabaan ki paakiizagi par koii Harf
nahiiN rakhkhaa jaa sakta hai, magar qaumi haisiyyat se ham is
zabardast kamzori ka shikkaar ho rahe haiN. qaum ki pasti ya balaNdi
chaNd muntaKhab afraad ki zaati kamaalaat par munHasar naiiN ho sakti"
Indeed, if at all any words have become uncommon now, they are words
like "yagaanah-e-rozgaar" and "ma'duum".
As for Hindi words, it is impossible to remove them from Urdu; the
language will become meaningless. It is instructive to pick up any
Urdu dictionary that lists the origin of words. The three most
commonly found will be Hindi, Farsi and Arabic, probably in that
order. There is almost no word that the dictionary will list as
originally Urdu.
Incidentally, reading the Hindi writing of Munshiji, I was struck by
by how far away this language is from the one spoken every day by
Hindi speakers. From what little I could understand from the following
passage posted by Rajiv Sahib, I came to the conclusion that
ironically, Munshiji's own writings in the two languages are a
powerful refutation of his own argument about the commonality between
the two.
-------------------------------
"desh meiN aise aadmiyoN ki sankhyaa kam naheeN hai jo Urdu aur Hindi
ki alag alag aur svatantr unnati aur vikaas ke maarg meiN baadhak
naheeN hona chaahte. unhoN ne yeh maan liya hai k. aarambh meiN in
donoN ke
svaroopoN meiN chaahe jo kuchch ektaa aur samaantaa rahi ho, lekin
phir bhi is samay donoN ki donoN jis raaste par jaa rahi haiN, use
dekhte
hue in donoN meiN mel aur ektaa honaa asambhav hi hai. pratyek
bhaashaa ki ek praakr_tik pravr_tti hoti hai. Urdu kaa Faarsi aur
Arabi ke
saath svaabhaavik sambandh hai. unki yeh pravr_tti ham kisi shakti se
rok
naheeN sake. phir in donoN ko aapas meiN milaane ka prayatn kar ke ham
kyoN vyarth in donoN ko haani pahuNchaaveN?"
------------------------------
I would also hazard a guess that the language spoken by a typical
Hindi speaker at present is closer to the first of the samples of
Munshiji's writings quoted above.
Jamil
Naseer
Here is a link for "A Grammar of the Hindustani Language".
I have searched for all references in the Gilchrist article I provided
in my previous post wherever "Hindee" is mentioned. The following are
the finds.
1) Hindi Exercises.
I could not find a link to the book. But I found that the exercises
are "..for First and Second Examinations in Hindoostanee".
2) The Hindee Principles.
I was unable to find a link to the book or to any other link which
would give more information regarding the contents of the book.
3) Nastaliq-e-Hindi
Once again, I could not find a link to the book. What I did find is
that this was "published in three scripts ie Perseo-Arabic, Roman and
Nagri Volume I was published in 1802 and II in 1806.
4) The Hindee-Roman Orthoepigraphical Ultimatum
5) The Hindee-Roman Orthoepigraphical Ultimatum
I think the above two links are to the same book. Despite the title
you will not find in these links the "Hindi" we know, even if you read
the compositions in Devanagri.
6) The Hindee Moral Preceptor, Or, Rudimental Principles of Persian
Grammar
Despite its title, this book is about Persian.
7) The Hindee Arabic Mirror
This is a "Tabular view of Arabic words in the Hinduustanee Language).
I will leave it to other ALUPers to look at these links and decide for
themselves what Hinduustanee and Hindee signify. In my view, both
Hindoostanee and Hindee imply Urdu. Of course, I can not comment on
books 2) and 3).
Naseer
Naseer
links.
1) The Hindoostanee Interpreter By William Carmichael Smyth 1824
http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=GNwGAAAAQAAJ&printsec=frontcover&d...
2) A dictionary of Hindustani, by Duncan Forbes 1837
http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=rrkIAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA1&dq=hindustani&...
3) A Catalogue of Hindustani Printed Books--In the Library of the
British Museum
http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=SNsGo8HG5hQC&printsec=frontcover&d...
4) Teach Yourself Hindustani, By Thomas Grahame Bailey, John Rupert
Firth, A. H. Harley 1950
Published in 1956 under title: Teach yourself Urdu
Naseer
Afzal A. Khan
Naseer Saheb,
Thank you very much for providing the above link. Sushil Sharma
Saheb had earlier furnished another link where one could read
about the establishment of a special Association in Lahore and a
magazine which had the title "Roman-Urdu Journal". I had sent a
reply which I would request you and other ALUPers to take a look
at, once again.
There is no gainsaying the fact that, around that time, i.e late
eighteenth century and the nineteenth century, Urdu was indeed
a dominant language in India --- except perhaps in the deep south.
Also, I am of the firm opinion (strictly mine) that, at that time,
there was no concept of there being THREE distinct, separate lang-
uages in India (Urdu, Hindustani and Hindi). The word "Hindustan"
and "Hindustani" were being used a little loosely, merely in the
sense of the land called "India" and anything that pertained to
this land , viz. "Indian". The true significance of these
appellations can be traced back to the thirteenth century (the Age
of Amir Khusrau). In some other thread, I had written as under :
"In his well-known Faarsi, "Masnawi-e-Noh~Sepehr" i.e.
"Masnawi of the Nine Skies", Amir Khusrau speaks of the
dialects and languages spoken in his time --- about twelve
in number. He refers to them in terms that can be
recognized today only by linguists and other experts. He
then goes on to give them a collective appellation viz.
"HiNdvee" i.e. "of Hind". The reference is not to any
developed or well-established modern-day language such as
Hindi. The word "Hindvi" or even "hindi" has been used in
ancient texts and tracts only in this sense."
I think what I had written about Amir Khusrau applies with equal
force to the titles of books authored by John Gilchrist.
Occasionally, we talk of films too in our Newsgroup. So I would
like to invite a reference to a remarkable, topical and very
popular film of its time ---"New Delhi". I am sure UVR Saheb
has seen it. I commend it to Naseer Saheb too. It was released
in late 1956 and its central theme dealt with the establishment
of linguistic provinces in India. The hero is a young Punjabi
who comes to Delhi and stays for a few days in a Lodge where most
of the roomers come from different ethnic backgrounds. He goes
round the city looking to rent a small house or a room, but gets
rebuffed everywhere. The owners are Sindhis, Marwaris, Gujaratis,
Bengalis etc. who would like to rent out the vacant room to
someone from their own community. All these folks ask him the
same question : "Tum Bengali/Sindhi/Gujarati/Marwari ho ya
Hindustani ?". He comes back to his Lodge, quite dejected, and
asks the landlord : "Ek baat to bataao, yeh Hindustan kahaaN
hai ?". The point I am making is that, even in 1956, the land was
being referred to as "Hindustan". So we can't really blame the
Britishers for calling our land as "Hindustan".
The idea of "Hindustani" emerging as a separate language in its
own right is of very recent vintage, historically speaking. What
is more, the idea is fallacious, ab initio. Again, strictly my
opinion. Its name has been used mostly in the sense of "aasaan
Urdu" --- a 'register' shorn of its Arabic/Farsi/Turkish voca-
bulary. I don't think people ever talked of it in the sense of
"aasaan Hindi". Always the idea seemed to be to cut Urdu's wings.
And all arguments for adoption of "Hindustani" stemmed from this
insincere premise. "Why can't Urdu-wallahs"......" or "why can't
Urdu....". What Shri UVR said in his posts was also along the
same lines. To be sure, some reference was made to a sort of
"quid pro quo" on the part of Hindi and Hindi-wallahs. But this
looked suspiciously like mere "lip-service". Has there been a
single sincere attempt to tackle this issue by Hindi-wallahs ? I
think not. And even Balraj Sahni referred to this state of
affairs in his 1972 address.
I was quite unable to appreciate UVR Saheb's logic when he said
that some of the film songs penned by noted Urdu poets meant that
these ("different sounding") songs too were nothing but Urdu. I
will cite only a few examples :
Shakeel Badayuni was a well-known Urdu poet, and also a film
lyricist. Look at a few of the songs written by him :
1. Man tarpat Hari darshan ko aaj
2. Bhagat ke bas men haiN bhagwan
3. Tora man baRa paapi sanwariya re
4. O chhalia re, chhalia re, man men hamaar
5. Nain laR jayee haiN
And other songs from films like "Babul" and "Mela"
Just because Shakeel was an Urdu poet, can we say that songs of
the above type MUST NECESSARILY be considered as "Hindustani"
poetry ? At best, these may be regarded as "Hindustani" only in
the sense of being "Indian". That way, Hindi too can be regarded
as "Hindustani" !
Kaifi Azmi, another well-known Urdu poet, has written a few songs
in films like "Sankalp" and "Do BooNd Paani" etc. which,
(language-wise) cannot be called regular Urdu poetry.
Majrooh Sultanpuri too has written songs in films like "Naukar",
"Samadhi" (stg. Dharmendra, I think) and "Dehak" etc. which ought
not to be considered as Urdu poetry. This list can go on but, I
think, I have made my point.
In another post, Naseer Saheb has narrated a joke by one of his
friends who gave the "Hindi" definition of "Table Tennis" as
"Hari Mez par de taRa~taR, le taRa~taR". This is of course just
a joke and not even a good one either.
But, in the early fifties (maybe, around 1951), a noted Hindi
literateur, Dr. Raghuvir Sahay, compiled a Hindi dictionary. Now,
I have never seen it, nor can I find it online. But it was
definitely compiled. At that time, I had heard a large number
of people making fun of its contents. I don't know whether there
was any truth to what they had to say. Even as jokes, they were
in very poor taste.
I was only trying to make the point that people were keenly
aware that some sort of a sustained campaign was underway for
finding ridiculous equivalents for words of foreign origin.
And, in their minds, Dr. Raghuvir symbolized this campaign.
So much so that any instance of some "ultra~'gaaRHa'" hindi
word would bring forth the comment : "yeh zaroor Raghuvir
kee dictionary men se liya gaya hai". Possibly, some ALUPers
would know more about the Rughuvir Dictionary and its contents
At the end of the day, there is little point in carrying on these
attempts directed against any language. Changes like these cannot
be forced on the people. We should let them continue doing what
they are comfortable with.
Afzal