The Haunting Car

Three years ago, I wrote a blog post “The Tale of a Car”. It was about the word “कारयानम्” and the need for a suitable word that has its roots in Sanskrit itself. And two years ago, another blog post "The Translation Mindset". There were a few interesting reactions and feedback on that topic both offline and online. Some said we should use the words like गन्त्री etc. I have even seen some actually using such alternate words. For some, कारयानम् (or कार् यानम् ) is the only word that can uniquely identify this class of vehicles. So, according to them, it is okay to introduce this as a new Sanskrit word so everyone can happily use it.

However, this kind of thought process throws up challenges on multiple fronts.

1. Question mark on the ability of the language: In this great language of Sanskrit, each word has a very strong etymological foundation. In fact, “sanskrit” means well-processed, well-formed. The language is said to be thetmother of a host of other languages in the world. Many languages borrowed the words from Sanskrit. Many languages, to a greater or smaller extent, developed their structure based on Sanskrit. For a common vocabulary in the Indian subcontinent, in parallel to many of the English words, Sanskrit words also came into use. For example जलसेचन विभाग, जीवन विमा निगम, ऊर्जा तैल मन्त्रालय, and so on. What about the recent technology words in the area of computers, mobile phones, artificial intelligence? No problem. I found Shrikant Jamagni's research work presenting thousands of words related to computer technology. The Sanskrit language has a very solid foundation of thousands of root words on which a word for any object or action that exists today, for those that existed in the past and those that are still not imagined, at least for the human consumption, can be derived. So, with such a strong foundation, structure and rich background, how is it possible that there can be no word for a class of vehicles?
2. United, we fall: This is a typical Indian scenario in many aspects. We easily agree to disagree. Or disagree to agree. If an Indian word was introduced long time back- like the examples given above, then perhaps that would have been in everyday use by now. Unfortunately, that did not happen. The Hindi word gaadi was there. But, with the English language taking over our mind, thoughts and life, we stuck with “car”. Now, if someone tries an indigenous word for car, others might frown upon. Just keep everyone happy using the word from another language.
3. Lack of originality: If we look at what people in other countries say for car, it tells us few things about those people and how they think. There are words for car in different languages listed on the website www.indifferentlanguages.com/words/car. A quick look up of meaning of those words in each language reveals that in most of the languages, that word means auto, automobile, a vehicle, something on wheels,something that moves. In fact, the word car in English is derived from "carre", meaning a wheeled vehicle (originally a chariot). Notably, the Indian languages listed there use "car". Why? Because, we did not take the help of Sanskrit to come  up with a word for it. People of different languages around the word, including English, look at that object as a wheeled vehicle. They do not call it “car”. Many times, Hebrew is quoted as an example for the need to revive the Sanskrit language. Even Hebrew does not use the word “car”. So, in Sanskrit, is there no word for a vehicle with wheels, or something that moves?
4. “Language should grow” thinking: For many, a language is considered “alive” if it imbibes new words from other languages and its dictionary size grows. That is true, if there is a real need and a word cannot be formed in that language. By that logic, we will end up using Sanskrit like how we are using our regional languages in India today. Most of the words for daily use have been replaced by English words. Words for numbers have disappeared. Words from the Indian languages have become obsolete and non-understandable by their own people. Everyone easily understands the words fridge, mixer, helicopter, police, apple, bus, train, table, stool, switch, ice cream, and so on. There would be no need for Sanskrit words for any of these commonly used words then.

Some ask me why I am so much freaked out for such a triviality, and harping on this one word. Well, “first impression is the last impression”, or at least it is hard to change. We need to be mindful of what is fed to new learners of the language. If we bring a word into use, it will be adopted. It is up to us.