Personal essay: A writer on the dilemmas of loving the Hindi language in a Sikh Punjab
Rajiv Thind traces his personal linguistic journey and explains how it is intertwined with politics and culture.
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As a Punjabi, my nostalgia and love for Hindi may contrast sharply with the usual fears and resentment found in non-Hindi-speaking regions of India regarding the imposition of the Hindi language. In this essay, I focus on Hindi as a language of creativity and dissent rather than government bureaucracy. I will trace my personal linguistic journey and how it is intertwined with the surrounding politics and culture.
Saul Bellow once remarked that “a language is a spiritual mansion from which no one can evict us,” asserting his right to be an autonomous English-language novelist. As we shall see below, such literary freedom isn’t available in India when regional politics, caste exclusion and cultural hegemony dictate which linguistic mansion, or cubbyhole, Indians can inhabit.
The languages of modern Punjab
I was born and raised in Punjab during the 1980s and ’90s, mostly in Jalandhar, with a few years spent in Bhatinda and a brief period in Ambala, Haryana. I got to experience Punjab and Punjabiyat by residing in different urban centres. While 40 per cent of the Sikh-majority Punjab’s population is Hindu, Jalandhar is a predominantly Hindu city and a hub of Hindi-language print media.
Although Punjabi was my mother tongue, like most urban Punjabis I also grew up speaking Hindi...
