Urdu versus Urdu and Hindi versus Hindi

All over the world, I believe, people make use of the name of some language alien to them in order to convey their displeasure when someone they are talking to doesn’t pay attention to or misinterprets what they say. Consider the following example.

Person X: I think I have a fever.

Person Y: Do you know there is a new restaurant just around the corner. Do you want to try it?

Person X: Was I speaking in German? I am not feeling well!

The language mentioned in this manner, is always a language that none of those involved in the conversation can understand.

One notable exception to this rule is India, where many people use the name “Urdu” to mean a language that is completely foreign to them.  “Was I speaking in Urdu yesterday?”, a schoolteacher might scold his class for having forgotten yesterday’s lesson. Ironically though, which language would many such conversations be taking place in? The answer is Urdu! Just think how ridiculous the last line of the conversation mentioned above would sound, if the word “German” was substituted with “English”.

Imagine a bunch of friends discussing Bollywood movies.

Person A: तुम ने सरफ़रोश देखी है?

Person B: नाहीं, मुझे आमिर खान अच्छा नहीं लागता.

Person C: ओये, सुनो. कल PK देखने चलें?

Person B: मैं ने क्या उर्दू मे कहा था? मुझे आमिर खान पसंद नाहीं.    

‘B’ assumes that Urdu is a language that none of her friends understand, without realising that the language she has just used to convey her message is nothing but Urdu. Of course, if you pointed this out to ‘B’, she would probably swear that she was speaking in Hindi. Failure to recognise that spoken Hindi and spoken Urdu are the same language masquerading as two different languages is a common mistake in India and probably more common among people whose native language is not ‘Hindi’, myself included.

Am I claiming that Hindi and Urdu are the same language at all levels of comparison? Certainly not! Take Qaumi Tarana (Pakistan’s national anthem) for example. The language doesn’t sound even vaguely familiar. Compare it with Bachchan’s Madhushala and it would be preposterous to say that the two works are in the same language. This distinction is perhaps clearest in the ‘standardised’ forms, most commonly found in government documents. Documents in Hindi excessively borrow Sanskrit-based words while shamelessly ignoring equivalent and perhaps more common words of Persian origin (“वर्ष” in place of “साल”, “प्रारंभ” in place of “शुरुआत”, “निर्णय” in place of “फैसला”,
“प्रश्न” in place of “सवाल”). In Urdu the situation is exactly reversed. Contrary to popular belief, however, the underlying grammar in both these standardised forms is nearly identical, based on Khari Boli, the vernacular of Delhi (which for all practical purposes is the lingua franca of most urban areas in the Indo-Gangetic planes and many in the Peninsula as well), with the only differences being the presence or absence of Sanskrit-based suffixes and Arabic plurals. The major difference between the two forms is not the grammar, but the vocabulary, with one relying heavily on Sanskrit and the other on Persian and Arabic. The other notable difference is the scripts used to write the two forms. However, including scripts in a discussion about languages would be incorrect, as the way languages are written and the way they are structured are two independent things. Theoretically it is possible, within certain limits, to write any language in the script of your choice.

So when and how did the Hindi-Urdu debate begin? Christopher King, in a very interesting article, points to the North-western Provinces and Oudh (present-day Uttar Pradesh). Before the British assumed power, the language of the court in the Kingdom of Oudh was Persian. In the 1830s, the East India Company replaced Persian with English and Urdu (written in the Nastaliq script). Little or no formal written Hindi existed before then in the Khari Boli dialect (ignoring, of course, the literary traditions in Braj Bhasha and Awadhi, whose grammar differs from that of Khari Boli). In the second half of the 19^th century, the advent of competitive examinations (for entry into the public services) stimulated large-scale production of text-books on various subjects. This prompted many in the eastern region of the province which had a rich Sanskrit-learning tradition (around Varanasi) to publish text-books in a highly Sanskritised version of Urdu written in Deonagari script, in addition to textbooks produced in Urdu. These two versions, one highly Sanskritised and written in Deonagari, while the other borrowing a large fraction of its vocabulary from Persian and Arabic and written in Nastaliq, became communal symbols associated with Hindu and Muslim identities respectively. Today, Urdu is the official language of Pakistan (alongside English), while Hindi is the official language of India’s Central Government, although Urdu does enjoy official status in some states. 

But is that all? Don’t languages exist outside courts, textbooks, poetry, formal government announcements and speeches made by Sadhus and Maulawis? Shouldn’t day-to-day conversations, actual words spoken by people be given more importance while comparing languages? It can be argued that literary texts and formal education influence the way people speak. It is certainly possible. But, literacy rates in the Indian Subcontinent have always been low, casting doubts on the extent to which texts could influence spoken language.  Also native speakers pick up their language before being formally schooled, while non-native speakers are influenced to a much greater extent by verbally interacting with other speakers than any amount of formal schooling in that language. Just consider improvement in the Hindi-speaking proficiency of non-native Hindi speakers at IISER Mohali. The fact that a few years in the company of native Hindi speakers can outweigh years and years of formal training in Hindi (12 years in the case of many students from Kerala) in terms of its contribution to a person’s Hindi-speaking skills demonstrates the independence of the spoken word from the written word. Therefore spoken Hindi and spoken Urdu should be examined without referring to either the scripts or the literature or even news-broadcasts.     

Once you take this approach, all differences between Hindi and Urdu appear to melt away leading one to conclude that formal Hindi and formal Urdu are merely two standardised forms of the same vernacular, Hindustani or Khari Boli.  Would an Urdu speaking person say “मेरी उम्र साठ साल है” any differently? I doubt it.

Does that mean there is no variation at all? Not at all.  Vernaculars which are recognized as Hindi today vary greatly, in terms of their accents, in terms of certain usages unique to them. All these variants are intertwined closely with variants of what is known as Urdu. An interesting exercise would be to record several day-to-day “Urdu” conversations in Pakistan and similar “Hindi” conversations in India and ask people to classify them as either “Hindi” or “Urdu”. I would be surprised if such a classification turns out to be a straightforward task, if at all possible.

An article I read a long time ago (the name of whose author I cannot recall) sums up the debate succinctly by pointing out that while Indians and Pakistanis have trouble understanding each other’s government broadcasts, they are thoroughly comfortable with each other’s movies.  

References:

1.        Christopher King, The Hindi-Urdu Controversy of North-western Provinces and Oudh and communal consciousness,  Journal of South Asian Literature, Vol. 13, No. 1/4, MISCELLANY (FALL-WINTER-SPRING-SUMMER 1977-1978), pp. 111-120Published  (http://www.jstor.org/stable/40873494?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents)

2.       http://www.dawn.com/news/1156166

3.       https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fl4xppek2gY

Physics, Muscles and Unbreakable Sticks

   High-school physics tells us that when an object is displaced through ds (an infinitesimal displacement) under the influence of a force F , the infinitesimal work done in the process is given by the “dot product” of the force with the infinitesimal displacement. This statement can be summarized by the well-known relation dW = F.ds   (where vectors are written in bold). The problems that one has to solve as a high-school student usually involve pumps supplying water to a tall building or a lift at a construction site carrying cement to the top floor. All that the students have to do is to multiply the gravitational force of the earth with the height of the building to calculate the work done. I have done this so many times that “W = mgh ” has now become permanently imprinted on my brain. These textbooks rarely talk about problems such as the work done by a human being (or, for that matter by any animal) while lifting objects

   Consider the case when a person holds a heavy dumb-bell stationary in front of his or her face. To keep the dumb-bell stationary, the person, using his or her muscles, has to apply an upward force to counter the downward pull of gravity.  Since the dumb-bell is stationary, or in other words ds = 0 , the work done by the person should be zero. And since no work is done by the person, his or her energy expenditure should be zero; and hence, he or she should not tire at all. This, clearly, is a contradiction!  All human beings (including Arnold Schwarzenegger), while lifting heavy weights, will sooner or later, tire. So where is the catch? 

   If one thinks for a while it is not hard to realise that the answer to this problem must lie in the mechanism with which muscles function. Even though no apparent macroscopic work is being performed, at the microscopic level, the fibres that constitute the muscles must undergo rapid movements for which work in the  sense dW = F.ds is required. Therefore, even when the weight that the person is holding is not displaced, microscopic displacements of the muscle-fibres would require work, consume energy and hence, the person would tire.

   It turns out that the Sliding Filament Model, modern molecular biologists’ explanation to muscle contraction, uses this very idea at its core. Muscles are made up of strands of fibres which are wrapped around each other. The functional unit of a muscle fibre, called a “Sarcomere”, is composed of two characteristically different protein-filaments: the “thin” filaments made up of a protein called Actin and the “thick” filaments made up of another protein called Myosin. Actin molecules have specific regions on them which have a very strong affinity to certain domains on Myosin molecules. Ordinarily, these binding sites on Actin molecules are ‘hidden’ or not accessible. But a signal from a motor-neuron, causes changes in the structure of Actin molecules, ‘unmasking’ those binding sites, to which Myosin molecules can now bind. Such interactions between Actin and Myosin are called “cross-bridges”. 

   Sarcomeres are observed to contract when the muscle which they are a part of contracts. But does that imply that the protein-fibres (Actin and Myosin filaments) which are building blocks of the Sarcomere also contract? Scientists were able to show that contraction of the Sarcomere is caused not by the contraction of its constituent filaments but by increasing the overlap of the thick and thin filaments. In the relaxed state, the two kinds of filaments overlap over a certain region. When the muscle contracts, the thick (Myosin) and thin (Actin) filaments slide against each other in opposite directions, increasing their overlap and as a consequence (see figure 1), decreasing the length of the Sarcomere. This sliding movement is achieved by bringing about a change in the structure Myosin, which causes the Actin filament to be tugged towards the centre of the Sarcomere. This is the step where work in the  sense dW = F.ds is performed and the energy required to change molecular conformations is supplied by ATP molecules- the universal “energy-currency” of life. Therefore, a person holding heavy weights tires as his/her ATP molecules get depleted.

   It is quite remarkable that with the help of molecules such as Actin and Myosin, a trained weightlifter can lift weights in the excess of 200 kg (approximately 10 to the power 25  times heavier than molecules like myosin) above their head. In each thick filament, every second, around 350 of its myosin heads form five cross-bridges. The number of thick and thin filaments in a muscle fibre and the number of muscle fibres in a muscle are so large that, molecules which are insignificant on their own, when acting together, can produce enormous forces.

   Perhaps, a thousand years down the line, children’s story-books will not have stories of sticks that cannot be broken when bunched together, but will talk about how tiny molecules, acting in tandem, can bring about events of simply astronomical relative magnitudes.

United we stand!

References:

11.      Life the Science of Biology (8^th Edition), Sadava, Heller, Orians, Purves, Hillis,

22.    www.nature.com/scitable/topicpage/the-sliding-filament-theory-of-muscle-contraction-14567666

A Bad Day

Although shielded from direct impact by the majestic Albizia saman trees lining the street, an umbrella couldn’t prevent her from being thoroughly drenched. It didn’t help that she had an enormous suitcase to take care of and the winds just made matters worse. The rain had bombarded the city ceaselessly since it had begun four hours ago and as was apparent from the intensity of light reaching the surface of Caesar Road, it would continue to do so for the for the next few hours- a period which was of immense importance to her. It was 10:45 am and she had exactly 55 minutes to reach the train terminus and board the northward-bound express.

Despite the distance being less than 7 kilometres, leaving from Amboli for Bandra Terminus just 75 minutes before the train’s scheduled departure time, even on a bright, sunny day in May, is a significant risk, given the city’s unpredictable traffic- unless, of course, you can manage to manoeuvre yourself and your luggage in (and out of) an impossibly crowded commuter train compartment. On a rainy day in July – a time of the year when half of the city’s roads simply disappear – it is nothing short of suicide. Rains can make your travel plans go haywire in ‘n’ different ways. Water-logging can cause traffic-jams, grind some suburban sections to a complete halt. And for some reason (which I have never been able to understand), heavy rains always make it impossibly hard to find vacant auto-rickshaws.

Having stood on the street, in a rather unforgiving spell of rain, for nearly 20 minutes, without encountering a single vacant auto-rickshaw, she was already repenting not heeding her mother’s desperate urges to leave early.

‘Wouldn’t the train be delayed as well?’ It was a reassuring possibility. But with a sinking feeling she realised that many trains from Bandra Terminus would be running, at least till Borivali, on the eastern-most track, which is dedicated for long-distance trains and therefore, immune from any delays on the Western suburban line. Delays on the Western Line, where instances of water-logging are rare, are never quite as severe as the woes of its ‘Central’ counterpart, a line that runs through some of the city’s worst affected areas during rains.      

At ten past eleven, after what seemed like an eternity, a BEST bus turned left (as the Caesar Road, initially running west to east, takes a southward turn towards JP Road), to reveal a single headlamp, gliding very low on the road, trailed by a black and yellow, doorless vehicle- which made her heart miss a beat. As the auto neared, it appeared (you can never be certain, as the possibility of a small individual camouflaged right in the corner of the passenger-seat cannot be discounted) to be empty. The autowallah miraculously managed to hear her scream (“Autooo!”), amid the rain and the traffic and steered his vehicle to the edge of the pavement.

“Bandra Terminus?” she asked, her fingers crossed. The autowalla’s reaction couldn’t have been more annoying. He barely exercised either his vocal chords or any of his facial muscles before speeding away in the rain.

Dismayed, she kicked a small stream of water flowing on the road, grabbed her suitcase and started walking, the umbrella (now folded) tucked under her arm. She reasoned, her only hope of boarding the train was to walk till the junction where Caesar Road meets SV Road, hope to quickly find a vacant auto (and a cooperative autowalla) and also hope that the train would depart at least 10 minutes late.

She was about to step onto the kerb on the other side of the road, when a cry of pain made her turn around. A man was rubbing his right big toe, which was exposed in his sandals. The sharp leg of her suitcase which had been trailing behind her had, clearly, caught him.

“I’m really, really sorry! Are you hurt?” she exclaimed.

The man, who was wearing a funny, yellow poncho, put on a strained smile and said, “I’m fine, I’m fine. It’s alright.”   

And then they parted ways. She made her way towards St. Blaise Church, as fast as she could. The man in the bright, yellow poncho was quickly forgotten.

While she had been walking furiously, the man in the bright, yellow poncho had crossed the street, exhibiting extreme recklessness in his short journey to the other side of the street (prompting three different men to scream out some very precious words in three different languages). He looked to his right and waved his arm. Within seconds, an empty auto stopped near him. He got in and the vehicle pulled away from the kerb.

It was 11:25 by the time she walked past the church and crossed SV Road. Tired, cold and frustrated, she found herself hoping for a miracle. The rain had eased a little. Traffic appeared to be reasonably smooth, at least on the southward bound lane. She felt her prayers were answered when an auto drifted near her and a middle-aged couple got out. Without waiting for the woman to finish settling their fare, she got into the auto and announced her destination (“Bandra Terminus!”). She received no response from the autowalla for the next minute or so, while the woman (whose husband was holding a United Colors of Benetton carrybag) demanded that the autowalla return her change- a sum of Rs. 3/-. The autowalla, quite irritated, gave her a 10 rupee note instead. He shook his head as the woman walked away and said, “Did you say Bandra Terminus?” It was 11:29 am.

They travelled with surprising swiftness and she found herself praising the municipal authorities for having done a reasonably good job at maintaining the roads. She was relieved to find the perennially crowded section of the road near Andheri Railway Station to be relatively traffic-free. They took the Andheri Flyover to cross over to the eastern side of the railway line. A short wait at a traffic-signal (the 30 seconds at that junction felt like an hour), followed by a smooth ride on the Western Express Highway and an amazingly quick transit through the densely populated neighbourhood of Bandra (East) brought her to one of Bombay’s four main railway termini.

She handed the autowalla a 100 rupee note and without waiting for him to return the change hauled her suitcase out and started running towards the ugly white-washed building. She sprinted (rather awkwardly) past the ticket-booking windows, past the cafeteria, into a corridor that led to the platforms. Halfway towards the pedestrian subway, she realised she had absolutely no clue which of the six platforms the train was departing from. She doubled back to the main hall, narrowly avoiding knocking down an old man and dropping her umbrella in the process. Her eyes desperately searched for an electronic display board. She lost twenty-five more precious seconds before locating one, half obscured by a meshwork of cables and wires. Paschim Express was on Platform 3.

She dashed back towards the subway, oblivious to the curses directed towards her. Thankfully, the subway had sloping ramps in place of stairs. She threw herself down the slope and nearly lost control of her suitcase. Within seconds she was at the bottom of the slope, terribly out of breath. But there was no time to rest. The signboards for Platform 1 and 2 passed her in a blur, as she adjusted her course onto the ramp leading to Platforms 3 and 4. Dragging the suitcase up the slope took much longer. She glanced at her watch as she finally reached the top. It was 11:52.

It took her a few moments to fully comprehend the information collected by her eyes. A train was motionless on Platform 4. Its name-plates suggested it was Vivek Express and judging from the mood of the people around it, the train seemed to have just concluded its 40 hour journey from Jammu. Platform 3 appeared empty. But near the northern end of the platform, a yellow ‘X’, next to a red, blinking light, was just disappearing behind a bend.

                                                                                                                         

                 Inside the WAP-5 locomotive of Paschim Express the two Locopilots (they are never ‘engine-drivers’!) were having a conversation.

                “It was close. You risked your job, you know.” – Man 1

                “I know, I know. They might still suspend me!” – Man 2

                “They asked Patel to cover for you and he wasn’t pleased” – Man 1

                “Of course, he wasn’t! But he shouldn’t worry, now that I am here.” – Man 2

                “I think you must have set some sort of a record today!” – Man 1

                “Possible! But what matters is that I reached sixty seconds before the scheduled departure time. Technically, I wasn’t late.  And the trains are late today, anyway.” – Man 2

                And then he removed his bright, yellow poncho, hung it on a hook and went back to his seat as the train eased into its first scheduled halt at Platform number 8 of Andheri Railway Station.