Anupam- The Dreamer

Once we were a group of probationers having a good time in the swimming pool in Jamshedpur GT Hostel 1. We were from engineering side (B.Tech. graduates) and there were a few others who were from commercial side (MBA grads). There was one MBA chap who was flaunting his English skills even inside the pool, although he was from Hindi belt. It was not like he had extraordinary English, but just that he wanted to show-off his “intelligence” to the other guys.

I came to know that this boy was from IIM-Kozhikode (IIM-K), so I asked my college friend who was also pursuing MBA from IIM-K that- “Do they teach you that you always have to speak in English only even when you can do fine with your mother-tongue?” The answer which my friend gave astonished me! He answered- “Speaking English among “lesser mortals” makes us different from the crowd!” Are you f***ing kidding me! Speaking English, that’s it? I mean there is nothing against or in favour of any language, but from when did the language become the marker or identifier of one’s intelligence and wisdom?

If that was the case, most of the thinkers, intellectuals, scientists, researchers, engineers, doctors, poet, teachers, statesmen, would have come from a particular language only! But, unfortunately that’s not the case! Language is just the medium in which you can convey your ideas comfortably, appropriately and effectively to another person or a group of person. And the best a person can do it is in his/her own mother tongue! We should and we must learn other languages as well which are spoken locally, nationally and internationally, but this can never be an excuse to claim superiority of one language over the other.

Each and every language is important and deserves respect. Scholars and intellectuals who make a great contribution to the society can read, speak and write in any language of their choice. There are societies like Russia, Japan, China and Germany, where even today the research papers are published in their own language. The world may have a problem with them, but they absolutely don’t have any issue with using their mother tongue for that purpose.

And an individual shares a special bond with one’s own mother tongue. This thing I got to realize when I went to the USA for the first time. Earlier, in our college when we interacted with a group of students, of whom many was Telugus, we felt left out and bad when suddenly some Telugu guys started speaking in their native language to other Telugus. We thought that why can’t they speak in English or Hindi, atleast when the group consists of heterogeneous mixture of students from across the country! But, when I went to the USA, and we stood in a group of people where there were a few native English speakers also, then after sometime I also felt the urge to speak in Hindi to my relatives as I thought I could communicate my thoughts better to them in this language. At that point, I understood how close a mother-tongue is to the identity and expression of an individual.

Having said that, I remember when Swami Vivekananda implored to the people to learn both the mother-tongue and the foreign language with same zeal and spirit. He told that mother-tongue will become your armour and the other language will be your sword when you go out in the world! What a beautiful thought! Certainly, we must learn as many languages as we can in our lifetime because every language has its own beautiful vocabulary, history and literature. Diversity of languages and dialects is what makes a society more culturally rich and beautiful. But, at no instance, we should demean other language(s) or judge a person just from his/her ability to converse in a particular language! Because the beauty of character, intellect and wisdom is not a prisoner of any particular language, and that language of humankind is universal!

Till next time….