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ShareBangalore: Definitions are slippery, often contentious. Ask one for a Kannadiga in these aggressively cosmopolitan times and what you get is a larger, unsettling debate waiting to be opened. It is hard to put a finger on the Kannadiga identity. Yet, it exists, and is more than a sum of his social, cultural and political identities. It has little to do with borders, the flag, self-appointed guardians of culture, activists.
Occasions like Rajyotsava are relevant and essential to nurturing language, they say. The debate itself doesn't wander too far from language, which is integral to the culture in question. "A Kannadiga is one who knows Kannada, uses it on a daily basis in interactions at home and outside. It is the language he speaks instinctively," says film director TS Nagabharana, a "pure" Kannadiga. In that sense, language is the leveller, putting the "outsider" and the "insider" in one bracket. It is moving towards inclusion, he says.
Ten years ago, the Sarojini Mahishi Committee report came up with another definition. According to it, a Kannadiga is not merely someone who has lived in the state for more than 15 years, but who can also speak, read and write Kannada "reasonably well". Much has changed since that idea was formulated. New ones continue to emerge.
"Reject all political identities, accept all popular identities, but never forget your language," says theatre person B Suresha. Again, it is through language that a Kannadiga asserts his identity.
"There is the personal and the universal. An individual would be comfortable and happy even in a place that is intensely cosmopolitan if his needs are met as he continues speaking his language. Commerce drives cosmopolitanism. The seller has to be made to feel uncomfortable when he can't speak the language of his customer," says this Kannadiga at heart.
Globalisation is not promoting multiculturalism but forcing a homogeneity in markets across the world. In such conditions, it is only a pronounced confidence that can help one retain one's identity. However, there is no room for conflict between the local and global. The Kannadiga has to insist that the new entrant to his city pick up the local tongue, not the other way around.
Prasanna Kumar R is already trying that. A thoroughbred Bangalorean, Kumar continues to be a true-blue Kannadiga even in the corporate world. "I try to exchange a few Kannada words with fellow Kannadigas. People have to accept that. I don't see any limitations to it being the official language of communication. However, you can't enforce it," says Kumar who is a senior vice-president with an engineering services company. For Kumar, it still has to be Kannada classic movies, serials and plays. "I thoroughly enjoy all aspects of being in Bangalore and being a Kannadiga," he says.
They don't make them like Kumar anymore. Unlike him, the genteel, generous Kannadiga, open to new cultures and embracing new languages easily harbours an inferiority complex that doesn't allow room for pride.
"That complex develops when one speaks the language and doesn't get the appropriate response. Then, he is pressurised to speak the other person's tongue and neglects his own," Suresha says.
Inferiority is like a disease among the Kannadigas and it is their under-confidence that has pushed him from the heart of the city to its periphery. Now the Kannadiga population is about 32% in the city. It is abysmal compared to the local population in other states, says Prof LS Sheshagiri Rao, former chairman of Kannada Book Authority.
This phenomenon is not so universal and doesn't so much apply to all other tongues pitted against English. "Look at the Germans, the Japanese, the Russians. They don't try so hard to speak English. It is up to the English speaker to catch up," says K Suchendra Prasad, actor and director.
Suresh illustrates with an example: "A tribal woman from the Amazon forests was taken to an English speaking country and was asked if she needs a translator to which she responded saying it was their need, not hers." Here in Karnataka, the urge to please the 'outsider' has run over the interests of Kannada.
The Kannadiga's indifference is to blame for the degeneration of his language, his culture. "They are not proud of their language. How many people know the names of Jnanpeeth Award winners, names of a few books they've written, how many have read at least a couple of lines of these?" asks Nanda Gopal, a mediaperson. Unlike our neighbours, we are seriously disinclined towards our language and that is where the rot stems from. We've acquired a polyglot, multilingual identity and given up our Kannadiga identities along the way, he says.
Similarly, we need to create a new culture around ourselves and speak only Kannada to influence the others. "A language's survival depends on that.If not, Kannada might go the way of the dodo in less than 100 years, as research has already indicated," Prasad says.
That would be tragic for a whole culture. "It is said that when an old man dies, an entire library dies with him. If a language dies, you can imagine the loss," he says. The language is slowly disappearing from daily usage and we have become people who are neither proficient in English nor in Kannada, he adds.
Suresha calls for a larger movement that goes beyond all identities forced on us. "A Kannadiga has to reject all political identities, organisations, activism that are finding refuge in his name. Reject the flag, reject popular icons, popular culture," he says.This is complex, we should be looking for easy ways to handle them, he concludes. The Kannadiga has his task cut out.
