Imposition of Tamil.
There is so much news and uproar about imposition of Hindi in here that it got me thinking about it .Whilst the other states in Southern part of India are not against Hindi why is that there is so much allergy towards Hindi in here?Is it due to pride in antiquity and distinctiveness of Tamil , the mother tongue of people in here?Or was it turned into a emotional issue to unite Tamilians deliberately by Dravidian politicians in quest for power in the manner in which they advocated separatism to give a mega boost to Tamil pride, self respect and Tamilhistory before coming to power?
There is a lot of debate and emotional battles as to which of the following languages came first in India viz Sanskrit or Tamil .In here Hindi is considered as a highly Sanskritised language.Sanskrit is the language of Vedas and Brahmins are the custodians of Vedas .So i guess the self respect movement which was primarily aimed at dislodging Brahmins from the high position they held in society and mainly in the economy found its natural and logical succesor in this anti hindi movement.
There was a GOI committee set up several decades back by Congress govt at centre to look into common strands and unifying factors in Indian languages .My late Grand gather M.A.Ayyengar on his retirement was made a member of this committee .After a lot of research this committee came to the conclusion that all major languages in India including Tamil originated from Sanskrit and submitted thier report .The above information is available in internet if one searches for M.A.Ayengar.
I am not going to entangle myself in this issue .
This uproar over imposition of a language made me think about the imposition of Tamil upon Sri Vaishnavaites including Brahmins 1000 years back by our own Brahmin acharyas .
Though numerous litrery masterpieces like Kalidasa 's works , Banas' Harshcharitra which has nothing to do with religion is in sanskrit since Vedas , slokas, in Ramayana, Gita , Puranas recited as prayers are all in Sanskrit this language is also considered as a sacred language.I don't buy the argument that sanskrit is like any other language and thus whittle down its importance in Hindu religion .It is the language of vedas with special emphasis on its pronunciation to reap its benifits , and in that context sanskrit is also regarded as a sacred language.
Brahmins generally chant slokas only in sanskrit and i guess that is how it was till 10 the century AD when Nathamuni the first acharya of SriVaishnavaites in South hailing from Tamil nadu 's Kattu mananar koil made it mandatory for all Brahmin priests to recite Pasurums viz hymns in Tamil of all 12 Azhwars viz Tamil Sri Vaishnavaite saints belonging to 5 th to 9 th cent AD, in all temples in the sanctum , every day in the morning and every evening and on birthdays of the aazhwars.
Brahmins and non Brahmins are all expected to recite these Tamil hymns in praise of Sriman Narayana in his various forms, avatars and in his enshrinement as wood and stone idosl [moorthy] in temples acorss Tamil nadu and India .
Other famous achrayas down the ages , like Alavandar, Ramanujar , Desikan and so on complied with Nathamunis diktat , continued with it and fostered with greater enthusiasm this imposition of Tamil in Sri Viashnavaites daily religious and spiritual lives .When ever rebellions rose regarding such imposition and about granting a seat to the idols of aazhwars who belonged to various castes , including scheduled caste ,within the temple s sanctum it was put down by acharyas like Desikan who dipped into thier vast knowledge of shastras to overawe thier opponents with evidences from shastras to defeat and quell such revolts.
There could have been any number of reasons for Nathamuni to make it compulsory for all of us to recite Tamil hymns daily . I have no idea .He has also made it mandatory to recite Pann aazhwars Tamil hymns daily at temples in the evening as well as at home .Panna aazwaar was a untouchable .A scheduled caste devotee of Narayana.Like other aazhwars his10 hymns are all in exquisite language with a delectable description of Sri Ranganathar's idol from head to foot at Srirangam.temple.
What ever the reasons maye be for our acharya to impose Tamil on us in our daily pujas it is because of him that we Sri Vaishnavaites recite Pasurums /hymns in Tamil .Since Tamil is our mother tongue it is easier than sanskrit to understand the meanings , appreciate the poetic nature and , bhakthi of aazhwars and to assimilate it .My grand father MA Ayengar knew sanskrit very well at the same time he also knew all the Tamil Pasurums.Similarily my great grand father an erudite sanskrit scholar who wrote number of books in sanskrit has also written philosophical books in Tamil.
In my days at Ranchi the LKG teacher of our kids who was eating gol guppas sold in a open handcart by a dirty vendor near a huge open sewer near the school where we had gone to fetch our wards upbraided my husband's collegues wife , a swarthy and stout woman for not knowing Rashtra basha viz Hindi and looked down upon her like as if she was a worm .
Poor woman an highly educated person kept quiet and cringed at the onslaught.This teacher with unhygenic habits un becoming a of a teacher may have studied only upto 12 th or even less where as my Tamil friend had done Msc in Maths and was fluent in English .
I am not against Hindi. I have learnt it because it was compulsory in the schools i studied in states like Karnataka and Andra pradesh and i find no harm in students learning Hindi at school .
But the sneering uppity attitude of that teacher who thought that her mother tongue should be learnt by those whose mother tongue it is not and who are not comfortable with it , as a matter of right, irked me. I still remember that incident with anger . .She was no match for my non brahmin Tamilian friend's ,academic achievments yet she was looking down upon her merely because she did not know her mother tongue .The limit.
Maybe it is this sneering uppity, attitude of some of the Hindi speaking populace reeling in thier own self importance about thier language that puts off Tamilians.
There is a lot of debate and emotional battles as to which of the following languages came first in India viz Sanskrit or Tamil .In here Hindi is considered as a highly Sanskritised language.Sanskrit is the language of Vedas and Brahmins are the custodians of Vedas .So i guess the self respect movement which was primarily aimed at dislodging Brahmins from the high position they held in society and mainly in the economy found its natural and logical succesor in this anti hindi movement.
There was a GOI committee set up several decades back by Congress govt at centre to look into common strands and unifying factors in Indian languages .My late Grand gather M.A.Ayyengar on his retirement was made a member of this committee .After a lot of research this committee came to the conclusion that all major languages in India including Tamil originated from Sanskrit and submitted thier report .The above information is available in internet if one searches for M.A.Ayengar.
I am not going to entangle myself in this issue .
This uproar over imposition of a language made me think about the imposition of Tamil upon Sri Vaishnavaites including Brahmins 1000 years back by our own Brahmin acharyas .
Though numerous litrery masterpieces like Kalidasa 's works , Banas' Harshcharitra which has nothing to do with religion is in sanskrit since Vedas , slokas, in Ramayana, Gita , Puranas recited as prayers are all in Sanskrit this language is also considered as a sacred language.I don't buy the argument that sanskrit is like any other language and thus whittle down its importance in Hindu religion .It is the language of vedas with special emphasis on its pronunciation to reap its benifits , and in that context sanskrit is also regarded as a sacred language.
Brahmins generally chant slokas only in sanskrit and i guess that is how it was till 10 the century AD when Nathamuni the first acharya of SriVaishnavaites in South hailing from Tamil nadu 's Kattu mananar koil made it mandatory for all Brahmin priests to recite Pasurums viz hymns in Tamil of all 12 Azhwars viz Tamil Sri Vaishnavaite saints belonging to 5 th to 9 th cent AD, in all temples in the sanctum , every day in the morning and every evening and on birthdays of the aazhwars.
Brahmins and non Brahmins are all expected to recite these Tamil hymns in praise of Sriman Narayana in his various forms, avatars and in his enshrinement as wood and stone idosl [moorthy] in temples acorss Tamil nadu and India .
Other famous achrayas down the ages , like Alavandar, Ramanujar , Desikan and so on complied with Nathamunis diktat , continued with it and fostered with greater enthusiasm this imposition of Tamil in Sri Viashnavaites daily religious and spiritual lives .When ever rebellions rose regarding such imposition and about granting a seat to the idols of aazhwars who belonged to various castes , including scheduled caste ,within the temple s sanctum it was put down by acharyas like Desikan who dipped into thier vast knowledge of shastras to overawe thier opponents with evidences from shastras to defeat and quell such revolts.
There could have been any number of reasons for Nathamuni to make it compulsory for all of us to recite Tamil hymns daily . I have no idea .He has also made it mandatory to recite Pann aazhwars Tamil hymns daily at temples in the evening as well as at home .Panna aazwaar was a untouchable .A scheduled caste devotee of Narayana.Like other aazhwars his10 hymns are all in exquisite language with a delectable description of Sri Ranganathar's idol from head to foot at Srirangam.temple.
What ever the reasons maye be for our acharya to impose Tamil on us in our daily pujas it is because of him that we Sri Vaishnavaites recite Pasurums /hymns in Tamil .Since Tamil is our mother tongue it is easier than sanskrit to understand the meanings , appreciate the poetic nature and , bhakthi of aazhwars and to assimilate it .My grand father MA Ayengar knew sanskrit very well at the same time he also knew all the Tamil Pasurums.Similarily my great grand father an erudite sanskrit scholar who wrote number of books in sanskrit has also written philosophical books in Tamil.
In my days at Ranchi the LKG teacher of our kids who was eating gol guppas sold in a open handcart by a dirty vendor near a huge open sewer near the school where we had gone to fetch our wards upbraided my husband's collegues wife , a swarthy and stout woman for not knowing Rashtra basha viz Hindi and looked down upon her like as if she was a worm .
Poor woman an highly educated person kept quiet and cringed at the onslaught.This teacher with unhygenic habits un becoming a of a teacher may have studied only upto 12 th or even less where as my Tamil friend had done Msc in Maths and was fluent in English .
I am not against Hindi. I have learnt it because it was compulsory in the schools i studied in states like Karnataka and Andra pradesh and i find no harm in students learning Hindi at school .
But the sneering uppity attitude of that teacher who thought that her mother tongue should be learnt by those whose mother tongue it is not and who are not comfortable with it , as a matter of right, irked me. I still remember that incident with anger . .She was no match for my non brahmin Tamilian friend's ,academic achievments yet she was looking down upon her merely because she did not know her mother tongue .The limit.
Maybe it is this sneering uppity, attitude of some of the Hindi speaking populace reeling in thier own self importance about thier language that puts off Tamilians.
posted by K.C. Sujata at
2:57 AM
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