Revenge of the vernac! Time to mind your angrezi, mister

Time of India

3 days ago

A controversy of sorts erupted recently after home minister Amit Shah's declaration at a book launch in Delhi that 'those who speak English will soon feel ashamed — the creation of such a society (in India) is not far away.'
The comments attracted widespread criticism from the opposition, which accused Shah of pushing the RSS's agenda of cultural domination. Congress leader Rahul Gandhi said the BJP-RSS did not want underprivileged children to learn English and make progress to become equal.
So, what does it mean when a powerful politician hints at shaming people for speaking the language of colonial masters? Is it an unpleasant yet necessary process of the much-needed linguistic decolonisation of our minds, as Shah claims?
Credit: Chad Crowe
Or is it clever political messaging meant for the vast majority of aspiring young men and women from small towns and villages who speak in the 'vernacular' and hold an irrational grudge against the English-speaking class living in metropolitan India?
Just to contextualise, the etymology of the word 'vernacular' is interesting: it is derived from the Latin word 'verna', which means a slave born in his master's house. One of the other variants derived from 'verna' is 'vernaculum' — a low-bred person or proletarian.
I was made aware of my 'vernac' identity many years ago when an acquaintance hurled the word at me as an insult. He spoke rather fluent English and kept referring to Hindi speakers as 'vernacs' — a derogatory term to describe those who speak in the vernacular. I, on the other hand, was trying to argue with him in Hindi — the language I am most comfortable in.
But my combative antagonist was not willing to stoop to my level by answering in the language of the general hoi polloi. Around the same time, I was offered a job in an upmarket English-language news magazine. But my excitement came crashing down in the very first editorial meeting.
While colleagues were rattling off story ideas in their clipped accents and perfect diction, peppering their pitch with public school jokes, I forgot my well-rehearsed lines when my turn came, and could only manage to mumble a few words in Hindi.
Suddenly, a thick pall of oppressive silence fell in the editor's room. I could see embarrassed faces all around me; some colleagues looking down at the floor to avoid eye contact. The sacrilege had been committed.
A yokel had sneaked into the 'Exclusive Club of the English-speaking Gentry' and defiled it with his lowbrow 'vernacular', or so I thought. That was my first embarrassing encounter with linguistic shame.
Dr Lori Gallegos, professor of philosophy at Texas State University, defines linguistic shame as something that 'involves feelings of embarrassment, a sense of inferiority, and attitudes of self-reproach that arise in relation to the way one speaks.'
She equates linguicism with other forms of discrimination, like racism and sexism. Apart from direct linguicism, which is still practised in some South Asian convents and public schools, there is another form of discrimination where 'people implicitly view those who do not speak English as uneducated or unintelligent.'
PM Modi himself faces this kind of glottophobia regularly when he is mocked for mispronouncing an English word or phrase. Amit Shah's son, Jay Shah, is also trolled for his lack of fluency in English. Against this backdrop, Shah's unapologetic reverse linguicism — though one is not justifying it — becomes somewhat understandable. Ironically, Shah was echoing the sentiments expressed by the celebrated Kenyan-American Marxist writer Ngugi wa Thiong'o, who died last month.
Thiong'o shunned the English language back in the 1970s and declared that in future, he would only write in his mother tongue, Gikuyu. It was his way of protesting against the imposition of the language of the colonial masters, which he described as a 'cultural bomb'.
So, when the wider Sangh Parivar eulogises India's past, it may appear to be rejecting the effect of the 'cultural bomb' as described by Thiong'o, but there's a big difference between the two.
While Thiong'o sees English and many other European languages as an assault on native African languages, the Hindutva narrative is more selective in its approach. Urdu, an out-and-out Indian language, is as much an anathema to them as English.
A more troubling thought is how such rhetoric could encourage the right wing's vast army of foot soldiers — often drawn from under-educated and poor marginalised castes who resent the English-speaking elite.
Some of them have taken on the role of cow vigilantes who patrol highways. This foot soldier could now potentially have another assignment as a bhasha rakshak dal (defenders of language) vigilante — going from room to room in Delhi Gymkhana or the swanky clubs in South Mumbai, or inspecting seminar halls in universities and the India International Centre to check if the speakers are ashamed enough while delivering a speech in English.
Should that dystopia become a reality, will the angreziwallas be then forced to form secret societies where one could only whisper in a language that shall not be named?
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Views expressed above are the author's own.