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Tuesday, 20 November 2012

Out of Communication


Communicating with God

The I&B Ministry is considering steps to make India a major centre for digital communication. –Eco Times.

In good old days drums, bells, trumpets etc were the means of communications. Times have ch
anged & new gizmos have been appearing every other day.

Communications are important in all walks of life. Between individuals, between leaders & public, even in between relatives - be it in-laws or out-laws, between Chairman of the promotion committee & the candidate. For example take the following dialogue-

Chairman: How far you are loyal & accountable to the Bank?
Yours Truly: 100% Sir
Chairman: How do you say that?
Yours Truly: In all the letters issued to me so far, I have been held fully accountable!

Mark my words candidates - you need to carefully weigh the words. Not communicating properly means trouble.

Sonia talked to ManMohan in proper words. ManMohan could not communicate in proper words to Mamata & the result was disaster! Very foundation of coalition was shaken!

Our Zonal Manager The Baldy has excellent communication skills which are evident in our meetings. He always says that listening to him while keeping quiet is good communication. No dialogue is needed. Only one way communication.

Now spoken communication is two-way street- Listening & Speaking. My better-half occupies one-way street of speaking & Yours Truly is always on other street of listening. Underneath this policy lies a small story. Once she asked me to bring 1000 gms of onions & 100 gms of garlic while coming back from office. And while coming back from office I deliberated on the order, weighed the options, got confused on the communication & inadvertently brought home 100 gms of onions & 1000 gms of garlic. Well you are right as since then I travel on Listening Street!

Forget all this. Let’s sit down & have cordial communication over cool glass of beer!

Baabe di full kirpa


English-Vinglish

'British diplomats in India are learning Hindi to develop a deeper understanding of the country and to identify business opportunities for British firms – BBC news item'.

Firangis have completed full circle. They were looking for business opportunities without learning Hindi 200 years ago. Now they are coming again this time equipped with Hindi to identify business opportunities!

Last time they were keen that every Hindustani learns English but left India without learning Hindi. And now? It’s business stupid!

In India there are 22 official languages. As per one estimate there are 398 living languages & nearly 2000 dialects in India. As for the world languages, here is the list of native speakers of 10 top languages of the world published by Ethnologue in 2023 ( available in Wikipedia):

LanguageNative speakers
(in millions)
Language familyBranch
Mandarin Chinese941Sino-TibetanSinitic
Spanish486Indo-EuropeanRomance
English380Indo-EuropeanGermanic
Hindi345Indo-EuropeanIndo-Aryan
Bengali237Indo-EuropeanIndo-Aryan
Portuguese236Indo-EuropeanRomance
Russian148Indo-EuropeanBalto-Slavic
Japanese123JaponicJapanese
Yue Chinese86Sino-TibetanSinitic
Vietnamese85AustroasiaticVietic

For deeper understanding of any country, learning their language is a good tool. Now every language has alphabet, grammar & phonetics or spoken words. As regards alphabet English & Hindi have similar styles as both are not pictorial like Mandarin. But a few differences are there – Hindi ‘ta’ 'त' as in Tandoor, Hindi ‘da’ 'द' sound as in ‘Dada’, Hindi da 'ड़' as in ‘Vada’ or in ‘Chidia’ are missing in English. Nasal sound as in ‘kyon’ or ‘Doston mein’ is missing in English, Pnwaar becomes Panwar, Kunwar becomes Kanwara etc.

Another peculiarity a Firangi trying to learn Hindi, must understand about Hindi dual words spoken frequently such as Khana-vana, Chota-mota, Dekha-bhala, Davaa-daaru or even English-Vinglish!

He may learn good, grammatically correct, bookish Hindi in homeland and land up in Delhi having following dialogue with our friend Harender:

Firangi: Aapkaa kiyaa haal haaii?


Harender: Baabe di full kirpa sir jee!

Hmm the Firangi might not understand the reply in full. He might as well take lessons from Harender!