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LOVE THY LANGUAGE

BUT DON’T HATE OTHER LANGUAGES

My Dear Bharat
Mother of many languages
has today become the stage
for the wild dance of linguistic madness
with sprouts of hatred waving their dirty heads�

Only the name of Nannayya I know
Never did I care to master his works.

Kambar was a great Tamil poet, it is said,
But what of it? I don't know that language fully.

I studied English literature, of course,
But little do I know the beauties of that language.

I heard about Krithivasa “Sarvajna�
“Eluthachan� and “Suradas�
What they wrote I don’t know.

Still I assert, “My language is the best
And there is no equal to it.�

Linguistic fanaticism is growing
day by day by leaps and bounds.

This dirty darkness must yield place
to the hearty sunrise of tolerance.

If building iron walls
between language and language
is the function of a language,
I don't want the hissing of this venomous serpent.

What man did yesterday,
machine is doing today.
New sprouts of culture
are rising by the second,

East and West are coming closer.
I can’t shut my eyes to this new light
and sit in a corner in perfect isolation.

It is by an adequate process of give and take
that languages grew to their present stature.
This is the truth history tells us.

My language must transliterate
the sounds of the modern machine.

It must tell me the secrets of the moon
and the wonders of the skies.

It must give me the fruits and flowers
of modern scientific knowledge
with absolute clarity.

It must reveal
the sweet and ecstatic thoughts
concealed in the heart.

It must grow flowers ofunderstanding
among men and nations.

Oh Lord! give me the tolerance ofpurity
and love for my language
without hatred for other languages.

Translated from the original in Telugu

by Dr SANKARA SRI RAMA RAO