Not knowing English is no shame

English may be a universal language but not knowing it is not a shame. I always thought Indians are better in language command as their tongues wag in at least 4 different languages every day, every time.

As my next-door neighbour at the office jostled into the office with a request the other day, I presumed it to be something else than what he asked for. It was to draft a covering letter for his company brochure. He said he has prepared one but doubted whether he wrote the correct language. I said I could improvise if I get that letter forwarded to my email. He meekly surrendered and said he wrote none. I insisted he should write one and forward me to correct since I had no time to think of writing a letter for him – And I was not in the letter writing business at all.

Word to word correction was imminent. But what surprised me was the last line, which read something like this. “So sir, please allow us one chance to perform on you”.

I wondered whether he was in Phuket. I could not fathom what he wanted to say and called him. He said he just translated from a covering letter he received from some of his clients and it was in Gujarati. It read – “Amne sevano ek mauko aapo” or in Hindi ‘हमें सेवा का एक अवसर दे ” or in plain English “Please give us a chance to serve you”.

But I asked him where this ‘performance’ angle appeared in a letter where he had nothing to perform at all. In the meanwhile, my office boy entered carrying with him an answer for a question that I asked him in the morning about a new office being built on the ground floor. “It is a Sabarkanta sir,” he said. Huh !, What the hell is that??

I then realized he wanted to say ‘Cyber Café’ and went on to get deep into one of the districts of Gujarat. English – not being the mother tongue for Indians – has a history of goof ups in India. There is nothing wrong not to know English. We go through a phase of surviving with many languages that we learn when we are aged less than 6 years.

Compare it with an American or English kid. He only knows one language and that is English. Now if you ask an American child to write couple of sentences, he will look like Mr Beans in a beanbag.

Consider an Indian child. If the child happens to be in Gujarat, then he knows Gujarati, Hindi and English. Many also know Marathi if he happens to migrate to Mumbai and if the child is from another state settled here; he knows at least two more languages.

Now that is the richness of Indian kids. So not knowing English is no sin. But pretending to know it is certainly a problem. If you happen to do that, then some body will ‘perform’ on you that you can easily avoid for the time being.

Binu Alex

Speci’men’ signatures of Kinnars

Signatures that Kinnars leave permanently on walls

It was amazing that in two days we could collect as much as 40,000 for a get together and then had it conducted very successfully. As I went collecting contributions for this, I realized how difficult it is for the ‘Kinnars’ to reach out to prospective money givers and then keeping track of them on a regular basis.

We were certainly in a group and the members were more than happy to contribute. One of the group members suggested we should leave a mark on the doors the way Eunuchs write their names to declare that a group has visited the house and has made a major hole to the monthly earning of that particular family.

I have parted a major part of my salary to this tribe both at home and office. I tried to reason with them to produce a bill so that I can pay by cheque. She/he glanced at me as if they will take revenge by getting me admitted to their group. Last year, we tried to make them wait after having agreed to a small sum to discuss internally if we can reduce the amount further.
One of them forcibly entered our meeting room in the office and said any one could count a million by this time. We settled for the agreed amount. The new office and the new home were bigger than the previous addresses. So the amount has to be bigger. So Sonia, Maya, Pinky, Renuka, Muskan and Party entered with demand of nothing less than an IMF loan.

Their leader Pinki massi was soft on me kindling me like her/his son. Sympathetic towards my helplessness in disbursing an amount on voucher without a proper bill was nothing short of a maternal care. I asked her a basic accountancy question of how to show this in the account. “It is none of my business,” she replied loudly but with compassion.

Their departure left a permanent mark. Not in my heart or body but on the walls outside the door. They also promised to return by Holi, Diwali, New Year and other festivals. Wonder where they are going to inscribe their Fateh Nama if this series go beyond a decade. 

Binu Alex

Letter to AMC Commissioner

To
The Municipal Commissioner
Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation
Ahmedabad

Sir

We are members of La Habitat Apartment, located on the 100 Ft Road from SG Highway to Hebatpur. While we thank you for putting into place the sewage lines there are unresolved issues, which is harming the residents, especially children and women.

One major problem we are facing is lack of lighting on the approach road from Aayna complex, Suvarna Bungalows, Shukun Bungalows to La Habitat. Since the road was dug up, this monsoon saw heavy water logging and clubbed with darkness, two wheelers were seen slipping on the mud.

Needless to say it is virtually impossible to walk on this road without torchlight. We have some 200 families in and around the area using this road. Request you to kindly put in place lighting arrangements for greater common good. In addition to this, the road has become a dumping yard since there is no arrangement for lifting garbage. We are also taxpayers like any other Ahmedabad residents and by denying these services; we are made to suffer with no fault of ours.

Secondly the most worrying part is the denial of permission to Adani Energy Limited to complete their digging and pipeline laying work towards finishing their last mile connectivity to the residents of La Habitat. Each resident of this apartment has paid for the connection and is now struggling to get cooking LPG cylinders.

We would be grateful if you could expedite these matters at the earliest.

Thanks and warm regards

La Habitat Residents