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Indian Express
2 days ago
- General
- Indian Express
The true story of how Hindi emerged — and how it was politicised
A recent podcast featuring Babu K Verghese, author of Let There Be India: Impact of the Bible on Nation Building, made a surprising claim: Hindi was 'created' by Christian missionaries during the colonial period. While Verghese praised the contributions of missionaries to Indian society, his assertion that Hindi was a missionary creation is historically inaccurate and deeply misleading. Far from being the invention of colonial evangelists, the Hindi language — variously known in earlier times as Hindvi, Dehlavi, Gujri, Dakkani, or Dakhni, as noted by scholars Shamsur Rahman Faruqi and Tariq Rahman — has a documented lineage that predates the colonial encounter by several centuries. As early as the 13th century, the poet Amir Khusrau composed verses in Hindvi, attesting to the language's long-standing cultural and literary presence. By the time the British set foot in India, the language was already deeply embedded in the region's oral, literary, and devotional traditions. What the missionaries did, however, was that they reshaped and reframed Hindi. Through grammar writing, translation, and the strategic use of script and vocabulary, they contributed to the codification and communalisation of Hindi in ways that increasingly associated it with Hindu identity. Their linguistic interventions played a significant role in recasting language as a marker of religious affiliation, particularly in northern India. Missionaries in colonial India were among the first Europeans to seriously engage with Indian vernaculars. To communicate effectively with the local population, missionaries needed not only to learn the language but codify it into grammar, script, and vocabulary. They compiled dictionaries, wrote grammars, and most importantly, translated the Bible into regional languages. But these were far from neutral acts. Translation is always a process of selection and emphasis. The Serampore missionaries, for instance, were translating the Bible into what they called 'Hindoostanee'— a language affiliated with Sanskrit in structure and vocabulary, printed in the Devanagari script, and targeted at the Hindu population. In contrast, 'Oordoo,' they said, was a variant of Persian used by Muslim rulers, written in Persian script, and meant for Muslims. This linguistic bifurcation was neither natural nor necessary. In reality, Hindustani was widely spoken across north India by both Hindus and Muslims. The distinction was more ideological than linguistic. But once institutionalised through missionary publications and education, it took on a life of its own. One of the earliest and influential figures in this process was William Yates. His 1827 publication, Introduction to the Hindoostanee Language, played a decisive role in distinguishing Hindi and Urdu as two separate languages, rather than dialects of the same vernacular. Yates claimed that Hindi was derived from Sanskrit and spoken primarily by Hindus, while Urdu drew from Persian and Arabic and belonged to the Muslim population. He emphasised that the two languages had not only different vocabularies and scripts but also distinct cultural and religious resonances. Yates' views were echoed and amplified by later missionaries like Rev W Etherington. In the 1870s, Etherington produced a Hindi grammar that stripped the language of all Arabic, Persian, and Urdu influences, and instead emphasised a pure, Sanskrit-derived lexicon. He explicitly rejected 'foreign aid' for Hindi, advocating a form of linguistic Hinduisation. His grammar, Bhasha Bhaskar, was even awarded by the British government, a testament to the close alignment between missionary and colonial knowledge production. Samuel Henry Kellogg's Grammar of the Hindi Language (1876) added a more scholarly layer to these claims. Kellogg estimated that 60 to 70 million people in India spoke Hindi and noted its widespread use across the heartland of Hindu pilgrimage and culture — Benares, Mathura, Allahabad, and others. Kellogg lamented that many Hindus had come to 'contemn their native tongue' in favour of Urdu, due to its usage in government offices and its cultural capital in urban centres. He insisted that Hindi and Urdu were not merely two scripts of the same language but had different grammatical structures and sociolinguistic functions. Importantly, Kellogg criticised the idea, still common among some British administrators, that replacing Persian words with Sanskrit ones made Urdu into Hindi. Kellogg's framing reinforced the broader trend: Language was increasingly seen not just as a means of communication, but as a marker of communal identity. While more empirically grounded than some of his contemporaries, Kellogg contributed to a colonial epistemology that sought to define and divide Indian society through language. While missionaries were not colonial officials, their linguistic work dovetailed with what historian Bernard S Cohn described as the colonial forms of knowledge. The British Empire sought to classify and govern India through knowledge by producing ethnographies, maps, censuses, and grammars. Language became one such tool of classification. So, the assertion that missionaries 'created' Hindi obscures the much more complex and troubling reality of how language became communalised in colonial India. Missionaries did not invent Hindi, but they reshaped its structure, use, and identity in ways that have had lasting political consequences. To understand this history is to appreciate how language, far from being a neutral medium, became a site of contestation and identity. Missionary linguists, wittingly or unwittingly, played a key role in aligning language with religion, a move that continues to reverberate in modern India's linguistic and communal politics. In the end, the story is not about who created a language, but how language was made to serve ideas of community, faith, and power. And that story is far more consequential than the myth of missionary invention. The writer teaches History at Bharati College, University of Delhi
India Gazette
22-06-2025
- India Gazette
Kerala's budget tourism cell organises buses from Kannur to attend Kottiyoor festival
Kannur (Kerala) [India], June 22 (ANI): The Kerala State Road Transport Corporation (KSRTC) Kannur Unit, under the Budget Tourism Cell, organised a pilgrimage trip to the Kottiyoor Temple on Sunday. The journey began at 6:30 am from the Kannur KSRTC bus stand, covering stops at Mamanathambalam, Mridanga Shaileswari Temple, and Puralimala Muthappan Temple before reaching Kottiyoor by noon. The trip was led by Kannur District Coordinator Tansheer KR and was arranged in response to requests from regular passengers of the KSRTC Budget Tourism Cell. Meanwhile, another district coordinator, Verghese, mentioned that more than 150 trips to Kottiyoor are expected for the festival, using more than 90 buses of KSRTC. 'The budget tourism cell is responsible to conduct pilgrim packages and tourism packages in Kerala. In Kottiyoor, this year we are expecting more than 150 trips from all the districts of Kerala, with 93 units of KSRTC,' Verghese told ANI. The tourism bus service has received a positive response from the public. One tourist shared that this was her first time travelling by bus to Kottiyoor, and she found it to be an enjoyable and safe experience. A tourist told ANI during the bus ride, 'I have been going to Kottiyoor for the last 2 years but this is the first time I am going under the care of KSRTC. Usually as I go, there is a lot of crowd, but this time under the care of KSRTC we got to do darshan and we were able to go to all the places safely.' The Kottiyoor festival, also known as Kottiyoor Vysakha Mahotsavam, is a mesmerising festival held amidst dense forest with the lush greenery of Wayanadan hills and the gorgeous River Baveli forming a stunning backdrop. The Kottiyoor Shiva Temple, also known as the 'Varanasi of the South,' is a significant pilgrimage site in Kannur, Kerala, India. It comprises two temples, Akkare Kottiyoor and Ikkare Kottiyoor, located on either side of the Bavali River. The temples are situated in a dense forest area within the Western Ghats. The Akkare Kottiyoor temple is open only during the Vaisakha festival, a 28-day event that typically occurs in May-June. It's located on the opposite side of the river and is known for its unique structure, lacking the common formal temple layout. The temple is associated with the legend of Daksha Yaga, where Daksha's sacrifice was interrupted by Shiva, and Sati immolated herself. The temple is believed to be a place where the Trinity (Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva) is present. (ANI)
Chicago Tribune
16-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Chicago Tribune
Review: ‘You Will Get Sick' at Steppenwolf is a slow reveal that's worth the wait
In a graduation speech I heard this May, the physician-writer Abraham Verghese talked about his experience as a small-town doctor during the AIDS era and how he found, to his amazement, that rural emergency rooms had filled up with AIDS patients even as everyone assumed the crisis was restricted to large cities. But many of these mostly young gay men had chosen, Verghese said, to come home from New York or Chicago to the likes of rural Tennessee to die. And for the most part, he observed in another stereotype-busting comment, he found they were treated by their families with compassion and love. The word AIDS is not mentioned in 'You Will Get Sick,' a rather unusual play by Noah Diaz that opened Sunday night at the Steppenwolf Theatre Company with Amy Morton (making a long-overdue return to Steppenwolf) and Namir Smallwood in the two leading roles. All we know is that the central character, known only in the script as #1, has been given a diagnosis of imminent death from an affliction that is never described. But Verghese's speech did come floating back into my head, because this is a play about how we handle not just death itself, but the period of our lives in chronological proximity to our inevitable exit. To understand the incontrovertible truth behind show's title — not exactly a box office seduction — you have to put the emphasis on the . Moreover, there are powerful themes here of working towards acceptance, of finding the courage to tell loved ones you are leaving. Diaz draws imagery from, believe it or not, 'The Wizard of Oz,' but Dorothy takes a long time to reveal herself, and nothing is solved by any clicking of heels. Here is the initial setup. Smallwood's sick character, #1, is having such difficulty communicating about his fatal illness that he chooses to hire someone to do the job for him. He puts out an advertisement to that effect and gets an answer from a woman, Morton's #2, a matter-of-fact opportunist who negotiates hard for piecemeal rates as she sets about her weird job, some of which involves her client's self-involved sister (Sadieh Rifai). Amy Morton is back on stage in 'You Will Get Sick' at Steppenwolf Theatre. What took her so long?That all might sound straightforward but Diaz freights the play with a much heavier symbolic load, including an amplifed, off-stage narrator who voices the things that #1 cannot bring himself to say, stepping pretty much on top of his lines. That takes a good while to understand and for it to become in any way comfortable as a theatrical experience. Meanwhile, #2 has her own eccentricities; she's a sometime actor who turns this truly bizarre assignment into fodder for her actor's studio and perpetual auditioning for her local community theater production. Other people show up (the cast also includes Cliff Chamberlain and Jordan Arredondo), but the less you know about them in advance, the better. Both Morton and Smallwood are superb here, not least because they are two Chicago actors of different generations who share an obsessive interest in finding the humanity in unusual people and then listening not just to what their character is saying to them, but also to others with whom they share the stage. They're both a real pleasure to watch. I think the play's symbols and metaphors get a bit too dense and oblique in places and this is one of those shows (it recalls the work of Noah Haidle) where you need a lot of patience before it becomes clear what the playwright wants to achieve. It's the kind of show that actors easily understand, being so suffused with the iconography of the theater, but it occasionally crosses the line of self-indulgence; I suspect some subset of the Steppenwolf audience might be a bit too baffled to care. Although sometimes moving, director Audrey Francis' production could have used some sharper edges and more of a forward thrust, especially in the studio scenes. But if you hang in there for just 85 minutes, not only are there twin beautifully crafted performances for you to enjoy but the surprise-filled last few minutes really pays off, not just in the writing but in set designer Andrew Boyce's visual landscape Certainly, you'll leave the theater thinking about what Diaz clearly wants his audience to think about. More specifically, it's hard not to watch this show and think not just about sickness but about how it is described and communicated. By a society at large. By oneself. After all, most of us won't be able to get home without having to tell someone where we are going. Perhaps the hardest cut of all. Chris Jones is a Tribune critic. cjones5@ Review: 'You Will Get Sick' (3.5 stars) When: Through July 20 Where: Steppenwolf Theatre, 1650 N. Halsted St. Running time: 1 hour, 25 minutes Tickets: $20-$136.50 at 312-335-1650 and
USA Today
07-06-2025
- Sport
- USA Today
Nebraska hosted 7 on 7 tournament praised by players and coaches
Nebraska hosted 7 on 7 tournament praised by players and coaches Nebraska Football hosted the Battle of the Boneyard 7 on 7 tournament on Friday, and it is proving to be a success. Multiple 7 on 7 coaches have confirmed that other events have already reached out to learn how Nebraska is running the weekend. This was reported by Tim Verghese on Friday. Verghese also noted that this is the first-ever sponsored brand tournament on the Nebraska campus. The tournament itself was sponsored by Adidas. Class of 2027 Nebraska football quarterback commit Trae Taylor elected to be part of this, playing on the Miami Raw team. He had a productive day on Friday and was able to connect with fellow 2027 recruit Ahmad Hudson for multiple touchdowns. Hudson is the top tight end in the 2027 class per Rivals rankings. Several prominent figures in the NFL circle showed up as well. Former Carolina Panthers and New England Patriots quarterback Cam Newton came to Lincoln, as his 7 on 7 team, C1N was present. Former Nebraska football running back Ameer Abdullah also made an appearance on Friday. All in all, this appears to be another successful venture organized by the football program and athletic department. There should be a ton of news to come out of this weekend. Contact/Follow us @CornhuskersWire on X (formerly Twitter), and like our page on Facebook to follow ongoing coverage of Nebraska news, notes, and opinions.
Indian Express
03-06-2025
- Politics
- Indian Express
At Harvard University, a reminder for America and the world: The truth is the best defence
In 2016, Oxford University Press chose 'post-truth' (based on popularity, in large part) as the word of the year: 'Relating to… circumstances in which… facts are less influential… than appeals to emotion and personal belief.' This was also the year Donald Trump was first elected President of the United States. Almost a decade later, (post-) truth featured heavily in physician and writer Abraham Verghese's commencement address at Harvard University: 'This is almost the reflex of so-called strong men: To attack the places where truth and reason prevail.' Since protests around the war in Gaza have intensified, more so after the start of Trump's second term, free speech and universities in the US have come under attack. The Trump administration has tried to clamp down on their functioning, including in matters of diversity, curricula, and hiring. It has blocked federal funding for Harvard and imposed restrictions on international students at the university. But even this, Verghese noted, is not a unique moment. In 1975, when Indira Gandhi imposed the Emergency and thousands of protesting students were arrested, 'citizens…expressed their outrage by voting; she was ousted'. Protest and a valiant defence of truth are the necessary pushbacks to assaults such as those evident in the current moment. The ban on international students' intake was blocked by a federal judge; protests have persisted, and as Megha Vemuri, class president, MIT, said in her speech just this week, 'we cannot let fear keep us' from doing what must be done. The US — on paper and in practice — has been the staunchest defender of free speech. It has taught generations of its young what it means to stand up for reason and justice, to hang in there till the difficult moment passes. Perhaps this is what matters even now: To not be cowed down and to stand up for what is right. As Verghese wrote in The Covenant of Water, 'In a time of deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act.'
