A script to bind
Rakshat Puri

Delegates at the 10th World Punjabi Conference held at Chandigarh recently. — Photo by Manoj Mahajan

IT is surprising and sad that the national dailies and media practically ignored the 10th World Punjabi Conference held in Chandigarh recently. Equally sad that many Punjabi poets and writers were left out, and some were not even informed. But those who came did make the conference lively.

This year’s conference somewhat broadened its concerns and context. It did not restrict itself to Punjabi language and literature, and to problems and issues that Punjabi poets and writers face on both sides of the border. It went beyond, emphasising the need to make travel easy between India and Pakistan and to also improve economic ties.

The delegates from both countries demanded that the "visa regime" be scrapped. The demand was led by no less than Fakhar Zaman, Chairman of the World Punjabi Congress. He and others advocated the European Union model which allows free movement between its member-states.

For the India-Pakistan peace process to become a reality for their people, economically and culturally, it is the border between East and West Punjab that has to be "loosened" for free and easy movement. On Punjabi language and literature, some serious discussion did reportedly take place. But some basics of the Punjabi language could have been further, and fruitfully, considered—Punjabi writing and expression in the context of its historical development. Punjabi is perhaps the only multi-tonal language in South Asia, meaning that a change in the tone of a word can change its meaning.

In the note on pronunciation in his English-Punjabi Dictionary (1919), T. Grahame Bailey observes: "Punjabi is a tone-language like Chinese." In this context, it would be interesting to rummage in history for clues about why and how Punjabi came to be multi-tonal – the World Punjabi Congress under Zaman could encourage such research.

Another possible subject for extended discussion could have been the script – rather, scripts. Since Partition, Punjabi in India is written almost exclusively in Gurmukhi. In Pakistan, Punjabi continues to be written and taught in only Shahmukhi, the Persian-based Punjabi script.

Attention has been drawn off and on to this persisting difference on scripts, which prevents literary coordination between both countries. There is thus talk of a Roman script for Punjabi. In fact, some Pakistani writers –Saeed Ahmed prominent among them — have been using the Roman script for to write Punjabi. The reluctant efforts towards a Roman script seem to stem from the need of young Punjabis abroad who speak the language but cannot learn either Gurmukhi or Shahmukhi. There are some Indian scholars already at work in the UK and elsewhere on a truly Indianised Roman script –Shreeram Vidyarthi in London is compiling a Roman Punjabi dictionary; and Subroto Ganguly in Wuppertal (Germany) is working on Romanisation of various Indian languages, including Urdu.

Only time will determine the impact of the conference on matters of language coordination as well as pushing forward the India-Pakistan peace process. But the conference indicated one thing, that Delhi and Islamabad do not quite express the views of the people on both sides. Asia Features

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