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Dawn Lahore Edition

GRIERSON ON PUNJABI, Selection from the Linguistic Survey of India, edited by Lal Singh and Jit Singh Seetal, introduction by Ilyas Ghumman; pp 572; price Rs500 (hb); publishers, Institute of Punjabi Language and Culture, 24 Ameer Road, Bilal Ganj, Lahore. ILYAS Ghumman's institute is better for its publication of modern Punjabi fiction and poetry and no other Punjabi publisher or institute can compete with it. In its brief history, the institute has produced about one hundred books including some critical and technical ones.

The book under review is the institute's first publication in English about Punjabi language which deals with all dialects of the language, included in the 10volume Survey of the Indian Languages ... a marathon job done by GA Grierson in the first decade of the XX century. The volume on Sindhi and Lehnda or Western Punjabi was prepared by Grierson in 1915.

During non-Muslims and Muslims rule, no attention was paid to the study of the languages spoken in South Asia. Even Maharaja Ranjit Singh whose mother tongue was Punjabi, had no time to devote to the vocabulary, grammatical origin and socio-cultural background of the language. It was left to British scholars to study and do research work on the languages of the subcontinent.

Due financial support for such venture was given first by the East India Company and then by the British government. The Calcutta-based Fort William College and then the Christian mission at Sehsrampur had done a lot of research work on local languages and their use for religious and administrative purposes.

When Grierson was assigned this job at a later stage, he studied it as an issue of Indo-Aryan languages for which Muhammad Husain Azad had also worked and had written his book, Sukhandan-i-Faras. Grierson's linguistic logic was perhaps part of the British imperial policy. Therefore, one finds this point of view reflected in many sociocultural research books by the British scholars-cum-civil servants like Ibbetson, Rose, Usborne and Richard Temple, in the Punjab.

Scholars of Grierson's generation paid less attention to the remnants of the Dravidian languages in areas which now constitute Pakistan. There are at least three languages in Pakistan - Brahvi, Punjabi and Sindhi - which have Dravidian influences which is another error in the grammatical evaluation of the dialects of the languages studied in this venture. The division of the study is, therefore, faulty. In Volume IV, Sindhi and Lahnda or western Punjabi have been included while Punjabi is in Volume IX which includes Urdu, Hindostani, western Hindi and Punjabi.

The Punjabi department of the East Punjab University and its languages department had reproduced both the portions in one volume in 1961 while Ilyas Ghumman has done a very neat job.

In Pakistan, the five volumes of the Survey, related to the Pakistani languages, were reproduced some 30 years ago but somehow they were never marketed. The four volumes were given the title, Linguistic Survey of Pakistan, with a brief note introducing the volume and the author, Grierson, who was born in 1851 and came to the subcontinent as a civil servant. He first served in the Bengal Presidency and in 1898, he was appointed superintendent of the Linguistic Survey of India which he served till 1941. His contribution to Bihari, Kashmiri and Hindi is also very exhaustive. According to his research on Bihari, there are more than seven dialects having their own grammar. That is why he titled the book, "Seven Grammars of the Dialects and Sub-dialects of Bihari Language", which was published in 1873.

His study of Punjabi and its dialects is also extensive but a bit confusing because sometimes he is not very accurate and definitive. For instance, the imaginary dividing line between Lahnda and central Punjabi is totally wrong.

Ilyas Ghumman deserves appreciation for reproducing this exhaustive study which should help clear the confusing claims by different dialects.
THE production of the book, Grierson on Punjabi, is a good omen for the serious study of the language and literature and an addition to such studies is the series of articles being written by university teacher Khalid Humayun about the worth of the doctoral theses on Punjabi on which have also been awarded. Khalid Humayun proves that the theses were approved not on merit but on personal considerations. His latest article in the monthly Savair International is on the thesis on Syed Fazal Shah Nawankoti by Muhammad Bashir Goraya. This series of articles by Khalid will help raise the standard of research in Punjabi at a higher level.