Speak up for Sanskrit

Sanskrit, the language of the Indian scriptures, is struggling for survival in the country of its own origin. But luckily, efforts to breathe life into it seem to be bearing fruit.

Says Dinesh Kamath, All India Organising Secretary, Samskrita Bharati, New Delhi, "We have failed to preserve our own heritage because we have not come up with innovative teaching methods to keep this language alive. We need to realise what a powerful tool language can be if taught properly."

Samskrita Bharati is a private group with its headquarters in New Delhi. It is working towards the revival of Sanskrit for more than two decades with the aim of bringing the pan-Indian language back into the mainstream. Explains Dinesh, "To know a language, it is important to be able to converse in it. The present movement aims to reach that goal.

"The decline of the language," he says, "was due to the methods employed to teach it. All languages, whether English or Hindi or French, are taught by simplifying the words in the same language. But in the case of Sanskrit, it was translated into Hindi or English to help learners understand the meaning. This turned out to be
a drawback."

"When the British set up rule in India, English slowly replaced Sanskrit. Later, in a newly democratic India, the language came to be associated with upper classes and held little appeal to the masses. The presence of gurukuls (schools where students live and learn under the guidance of a master teacher) diminished and the counterproductive method of teaching the language by translation took root.

"A child learns the language that is spoken at home. During that time he is only picking up the language, not its grammar. Once his curiosity for the language is aroused, he begins to read and write in the same language. That is how a language is imbibed into an individual's culture. But since this method was not put to use in the case of Sanskrit, its foundation was severely damaged. So despite the presence of Sanskrit texts in virtually every Indian home, no one knows how to read them."

"In India, we have news in Sanskrit only twice a day for 5 minutes on a particular TV channel," Says Dinesh. "But on German Radio, news in Sanskrit is aired after every hour."

Loved by the maths buffs

Incidentally, scientists and mathematicians in foreign countries consider old works in Sanskrit as a treasure trove of ancient knowledge in astronomy, mathematics, chemistry, medicine and metallurgy. And understandably, they are surprised and saddened that India confines Sanskrit just to rituals and prayers.

Says Dinesh, "In ancient times, it was due to Sanskrit that we were way ahead in all fields (of knowledge). In present times, Sanskrit is found only in rituals or in metaphysics. And all this is because of the unimaginative way in which the language has been taught for centuries."

In 1981, when Samskrita Bharati was established, its foremost task was to do away with the fallacy that Sanskrit was a difficult language to learn and speak.

The organisation started the Sanskrita Sambhashanam (Speak Sanskrit) movement to rekindle interest in it. It tailored a new style of teaching – through Sanskrit itself and not via translation into any other language.

An informal atmosphere was created wherein students were first taught the words and sentences they would use in daily life. Unlike in the past, when the language was considered difficult and boring, the new method found many takers. Today professionals wanting to learn Sanskrit come from diverse fields such as Ayurveda, mainstream medicine, school teachers and software developers.

Dinesh says, "(Learning Sanskrit through Sanskrit) is akin to receiving direct sunlight, rather than using a reflector. The language in its new form is gaining popularity with the new generation of Indians. A classical language that is the Indian equivalent of ancient Greek or Latin, it is being reappraised with a sense of pride by people both in India and in the US. It is becoming as popular with university professors as with the internet-savvy, mobile-phone-mad youth."

Around the world

American universities have long offered Sanskrit courses to undergraduates. But of late the demand for these classes is showing up beyond academic circles. No longer can the interest in the West for Sanskrit be brushed off as a fad.

Thanks to a burgeoning movement started by Samskrita Bharati, there is now an online Sanskrit magazine that reaches out to Indian students overseas.

Dinesh says, "Initially, a committed group of volunteers experimented by teaching groups in villages and cities. The publicity (to teach basic spoken Sanskrit in 10 days) was generated via word-of-mouth." In the past 27 years,
5 million people in India have attended 30-day workshops. These have been organised in different parts of India.

"It's my challenge that given two hours a day to teach it to an individual, I can make anyone speak Sanskrit in a week," Dinesh adds.

According to the 2001 census in India, 14,000 people quoted Sanskrit as their mother tongue, which meant Sanskrit was actually being spoken in homes. Some of the places in India where this language is spoken at home today include Mattur and Hosahalli in Karnataka, Mohad and Jhiri in Madhya Pradesh and Gannoda in Rajasthan.

In these villages, every man, woman and child can speak it.
Though 3 billion students are learning to read and write Sanskrit in schools all over India, they are not being taught to speak the language. Similarly, students who are graduating with honours in Sanskrit are unable to speak it fluently in daily life.

On the other hand, at St James Independent School near Kensington Olympia in the US, Sanskrit is a compulsory subject. The school believes that learning this ancient language not only helps students pick up other European languages faster and grasp mathematics and science better, but results in an all-round cognitive development of the child.

In the US, about 55 universities offer Sanskrit as a subject for a graduate course. In Japan, there are 53 universities doing the same. About 250 foreign universities have departments in Sanskrit.