Linguistic mayhem

 

There are some cute Haryanvi versions of English words. The self-made dialect born of farming twistology wherein the unpolished, earthbound senses, fuelled by rawitude and pehalwan-pride, give hammer strikes at the sharp, cutting-edge linguistic blocks to make smooth, round pebbles which are easy to manage with rustic tongues.

Raw, earthy, playful, brimming with innocent swagger and unlettered wit, the soil-born spirit knows how to get the high-flying linguistic puzzles down and dusted and make a new product as per the rhythms of lowing cattle and screeching tractors.

No matter how chaotic things appear to an urban guy, the Haryanvi farmers will give the feeling that everything is perfectly arranged and there is no scope for further improvement. They have simple tongues, which know how to figure a way out of complex phonetics.

With a sudden surge of bravado and confidence, you may hear a farmer making a ‘Llounsement’ which stands for ‘Announcement’. Don’t jump out of your seat if you hear it at an airport coming out of the mouth of a well-dressed, educated appearing Haryanvi.

Take or Tek stands for heart attack. Many farmers have heart issues due to the traditional fatty diet, which turns out to be too much for the system in an era of far less work in the fields due to the mechanization of agriculture. Less laboring work and the same diet of doodh, dahi, makhan and ghee mean clogged arteries. So one hears this word many times in local parlance these days.

Konch is coach. One hears it many times because there are many wannabe Olympic gold medalists seeking coaches in various sports especially in kushti and boxing.

Staap is staff. You stand a reasonable chance of hearing it in state roadways buses. Some policeman would tell the conductor, who approaches him demanding ticket, that he is ‘staap’ and thus need not pay the bus fare.

Tractor is taktor or taktar. That’s bow the children grow up treating taktar to be god, the boisterous farm-wise super-vehicle to smoothly play rough with life.

These innocently twisted words carry lots of weight. Rustic tongues possess hilarious ingenuity to smoothen complex words like a mighty river smoothens pebbles and stones on its bed.

With much pride and rustic confidence, making a mockery of the authority of language, the farming community fabricates its unique vernacular ethos. The charming exaggeration of their attitude adds icing on the cake.