On Indian English

Consider this state of affairs. A man works under a landlord for a period of ten years, during which time he learns to speak his master's language and picks up several of his (rather tiresome) mannerisms. Thereafter the master dies but his slave passes on these to his children so that it so happens that several generations down the line his great-grandchildren now speak the language of the landlord of their dead ancestor.

This, in fact, is the condition of Indians today who speak English : they speak a language that was passed on to their (immediate) ancestors by their colonial masters, the British. The question, however, that is really intriguing can be put in a rather abrupt manner : 'So what?'

Indeed, I often put this question to myself since English happens to be the only language that I am fluent in. But, to repeat my earlier question, so what? So what if English was the language that was once transmitted down the echelons of power by the imperial rulers in Delhi and Calcutta to produce rows of government clerks with Indian blood but British habits? Has this historical origin stained the English language so deeply that any Indian who now uses it (not to mention revels in it) is consequently stigmatised by the accusation of complicity with neo-colonialism?

Suppose we say 'Yes' and try to choose an appropriate Indian language instead. The problem with this search for an originary language that is not corrupted by some allegation of violence is that there was trouble even in paradise. For suppose that we replace English with Sanskrit : there will be a huge section of the Indian population which will protest that it is precisely users of Sanskrit who have been oppressing them since time immemorial. (And Sanskrit is not a very gender-sensitive language either, purusa and prakrti and all that.) Let us then plump for Hindi instead : even this will not quite do for vast swathes in the Southern belt of India will remind us how the northerners have tried to impose this language upon them in a 'colonial' fashion. The same problem, of course, will immediately dog us if we choose any other regional language : there will be no dearth of groups who will vehemently object to the violence that its users have historically inflicted on them who do not speak it.

In short, then, to claim that English is forever tainted by its colonial associations is indeed a very interesting (and substantially correct) statement but it goes nowhere towards answering the question that I have put above : So what? Does all of this, however, mean that we can go on using English simply by ignoring these associations? In matters such as these, it is good to remember that we human beings can develop the capacity for self-reflexivity, that is, to bend over backwards to some extent and cast a critical sideways glance at ourselves. A good example in this connection is Nehru, whatever his faults otherwise as a political strategist or an economic planner were. A consummate master of the English language, the language of his imperialist antagonists, and yet nobody, I take it, would accuse Nehru of not being 'nationalist' enough!