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Punjabi will not die in 50 years
Jagmohan Singh
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Ma-boli
Punjabi is spoken by lesser number of people, is facing threats
of assimilation and acculturation, its oral history has not been
well documented and its use on the internet is lost in the maze
of a variety of fonts. Still it is not an endangered
language writes the author after thorough research and
analysis. |
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 When a prominent
Indian newspaper highlighted that there is a UNESCO report
forecasting the death of Punjabi language in 2050, like many others,
World Sikh News too was concerned. WSN decided to verify the
veracity of the report and find out how the Punjabi language which
was spoken by a few millions worldwide would vanish from the surface
of the earth in the next forty years or so.
WSN decided to
go to the root of the matter and contacted the UNESCO office in
Delhi.
Like us, even the UNESCO researchers and documentalists were
distressed at the news report purportedly referring to a UNESCO
report, about which they too were not aware of. The refrain of a
researcher “oh! It is in a newspaper in
Punjab”
reflected the contempt for newspapers in the region. Lackadaisical
approach to important matters is not a problem only with
governments; even the most competitive media ignores basic norms of
journalism.
No such report,
says UNESCO:
The
UNESCO office in Delhi diligently checked up their records, verified
facts from their Paris headquarters and this is what they had to
say, “The
second (and latest to date) edition of the Atlas (Atlas of
endangered languages) does not list Punjabi as an endangered
language. We are currently in the process of developing the third
updated and extended edition, and it will be up to the editorial
board to take this kind of decisions.”
 Not
fully satisfied, we wrote back again, urging them to look for the
basis of such reference by eminent author and journalist Kuldip
Nayar as part of his lecture delivered under the aegis of Punjabi
Bachao Manch a few days ago, which function was also attended by
leading authors and a former vice-chancellor of Guru Nanak Dev
University.
The only basis
they could find was a report on Welsh and Punjabi language in
Europe.
We perused the summary of that report too and found absolutely no
reference to the language being endangered in any way, either in
Europe or
in the world.
Probing further,
we asked them, “Is there even a remote possibility of Punjabi being
there in the next draft report and somebody leaking this report to
the media or to some leading journalists? Their reply was that
“it was highly unlikely that the media could access such a report
even before its finalization.”
 So,
it can be safely said, with a justified sigh of relief that there is
no UNESCO report to suggest that Punjabi would disappear in the
coming decades.
The
correspondence with UNESCO provided an opportunity to dig deep and
understand the concept of endangered languages.
How do languages
become endangered and what is the status of Punjabi?
Language
diversity is essential to the human heritage and each and every
language embodies the unique cultural wisdom of a people is the
UNESCO mandate. Although 6,000 languages exist, the cooperative
efforts of language communities, language professionals, NGOs and
governments will be indispensable in countering the threat to the
existence of many.
UNESCO
undertakes extensive research into the status of languages
worldwide. We view UNESCO guidelines in the context of Punjabi
language. UNESCO says, “A language is endangered when its speakers
cease to use it, use it in an increasingly reduced number of
communicative domains, and cease to pass it on from one generation
to the next and if a language looses all its speakers,
it becomes an extinct langugage.”
Well, as far as
present-day Punjabis are concerned, they do use Punjabi, may be
somewhat less, but they do pass it on from one generation to
another. The Sikhs and Muslims continue do so.
UNESCO further
says, “Language endangerment may be the result of external forces
such as military, economic, religious, cultural or educational
subjugation, or it may be caused by internal forces, such as a
community’s negative attitude towards its own language. Internal
pressures often have their source in external ones, and both halt
the intergenerational transmission of linguistic and cultural
traditions.” Undoubtedly, the Sikhs are developing a negative
attitude towards their own language. The government of
India has
attempted cultural genocide of the Sikhs in a variety of forms
including machinations to subvert the Punjabi language.
 Starting
with the delayed formation of the state of Punjab, when the whole
country was demarcated on linguistic lines to the non-acceptance of
Punjabi as an official language in those states where it is spoken
extensively, lack of sponsorship of research and development in
Punjabi as an internet language, --all these have definitely
affected the growth of the language, in its own homeland.
Another
parameter used by UNESCO to test language vitality is review of the
governmental and institutional language attitudes and policies
including official status and use. UNESCO should carry out a
review of the role of the government of
India with
respect to the Punjabi language.
As regards the
type and quality of documentation, only the Punjabi University
Patiala has done some documentation into the origins and oral
history of Punjabi and the roots of the Gurmukhi script. This too
is being done with a shoe-string budget by a handful of dedicated
and diehard lovers of Punjabi.
Acculturation:
The impact of
Bollywood cinema, the anti-Punjabi lobby of Arya Samajis, partisan
neo-intellectuals and unyielding monolithic policies of
India is
unswerving. Though professedly secular, de facto the Hindi
language is the official lingua franca in Punjab and other
parts of India. This has affected the growth and development of
many languages including Punjabi.
According to
UNESCO, “in bilingual or multilingual settings, the phenomenon of
acculturation applies when the use of a dominant majority language
is associated with social, cultural, political or economical
advantages. In this case, parents of children in the "weaker"
culture may encourage their children (and themselves) to use the
language of the stronger culture rather than their own language.
Soon enough the young generation would loose the interest in the
mother tongue and would not any longer speak the original
language.” This is the case of Sikh children today. In Haryana,
Rajasthan, Himachal Pradesh, parts of central
India and even
in Punjab, Sikh parents encourage their children to speak Hindi
because they consider Punjabi to belong to a “weaker culture” as
compared to the rest, not to mention the perceived economic
disadvantages of learning Punjabi.
Politicalisation
of Punjabi:
 Over
generations, Punjabi has come to be identified with the Sikhs, just
as Urdu with the Muslims.
India has the
Human Rights Commission, the National Commission for Minorities and
the Linguistic Minorities Commission but what is the status of love
and respect for languages in the country? Most decisions are
politically perverse. This is not to say that the Sikhs themselves,
the Akali leadership and the Punjabi fraternity as a whole has not
contributed to the crises. The apathy towards heritage and culture,
including language is pathetic, to say the least.
Making Punjabi
Compulsory and what more should Punjab
do:
The Punjab State
Official Language Act was passed in 1967. The provisions of this
Act were held more in the breach than in observance can be gauged
from the fact that on
25 March 2008,
the Punjab Assembly was forced to adopt a resolution making Punjabi
compulsory in the running of the government, administration and
educational institutions. Do we need more proof of the official
step-motherly treatment to the mother-tongue?
If the
government of
Punjab has to
demonstrate interest in promotion of Punjabi, it may be well advised
to follow the Canadian pattern. All Canadian official literature is
in English and French. All stationery, including business cards of
legislators, all government functionaries, all public documents,
should be in Punjabi and English. The language policy of the
country popularly known as “the two language formula” has not been
seriously implemented at all. As UNESCO has stated, “A language
policy can serve as a political instrument, designated either to
build an integrated (or assimilated) monolingual society or to
promote the co-existence of multiculturality and multilinguism what
would enrich all engaged parties. A closer look at the language
policies of some nations reveals a trend towards a single language (my
addition –Hindi as in India), whereas the activities of South
Africa and the Member States of the European Union promote the
wealth and enrichment of linguistic diversity.”
All religious,
social, cultural and political organizations in
Punjab and the
Diaspora must adopt a policy of publishing every piece of literature
in a minimum of two languages –Punjabi and English. This norm must
percolate down to schools, seminaries, training centres and SGPC
too. All day to day work must be in the two languages.
International
Commitment and respect for Language diversity:
UNESCO
encourages its Member States to develop strong policies which
promote and facilitate language diversity on the Internet, create
widely-available online tools and applications (such as
terminologies, automatic translators, dictionaries, software) for
content in local languages and encourage the sharing of best
practices and information. The contribution of Diaspora based Maboli
Systems and other Punjabi groups to build fonts and popularize
Punjabi on the internet must be acknowledged. All organizations in
India,
including the Punjabi University should actively associate with
UNESCO for the growth and development of Punjabi on the Internet.
Recitation of
Guru Granth Sahib:
So long as the
Sikhs continue to recite and listen to Gurbani, Punjabi will stay
alive and kicking. If every member of the Sikh nation resolves to
do this, no conspiracy or detraction can succeed; in case we show
vulnerability, the sharks are waiting.
Corporate Sector
must use Punjabi:
The flourishing
internet and telecom sector, run by giants with unlimited funds, use
the local language of respective regions where they have their
networks, except in
Punjab.
The customer care services of all companies must be forced to use
Punjabi as the primary language.
It is time for
Punjabis themselves to wake up. Left to governments, we may have to
wait till Punjabi actually becomes an endangered language.
26
March 2008
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