Language Politics and Public Sphere in North India: Making of the Maithili Movement

276 Pages·2017·23.445 MB·

by  Mithilesh Kumar Jha

Language Politics and Public Sphere
in North India
‘A “language” may be a “dialect” with an army, but the historical, political,
social, and conceptual processes involved in the transformation from the one
to the other are far deeper than that famous quip allows. Few examples of such
transformation in India are more salient than that of Maithili. Mithilesh Kumar
Jha’s thoughtful study shows that the army can be an imaginary one, but no less
powerful for that.’
—Sheldon Pollock, Arvind Raghunathan Professor,
Sanskrit and South Asian Studies,
Columbia University, New York, USA
‘This is an incisive and meticulous work that adds to the growing body of work
on language politics, especially in the context of Hindi expansionism and its
effort to colonize other vibrant and fl ourishing linguistic cultures like Maithili.
It also tells us a larger story of the uncertain origins of languages and their fl uid
trajectories—seen for instance in Maithili’s close relationship with Bangla and
Ahomiya on the one hand, and Hindi on the other.’
—Aditya Nigam, Professor,
Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, New Delhi, India
‘An important and much needed work on the relationship of modern Hindi to
Maithili, a richly literary language that it sought to reduce to “dialect” status in
its own aspiration to be recognized as [a] national language. Jha’s detailed and
meticulous work on the history of the movement to restore status to Maithili is
exemplary, opening the way for further studies on related languages that have
suffered similar suppression.’   
—Vasudha Dalmia, Professor Emerita,
Department of South and Southeast Asian Studies,
University of California, Berkeley, USA 
00__FFrroonnttmmaatttteerr..iinndddd iiii 1155//1111//1177 1111::4422 AAMM
Language Politics and Public
Sphere in North India
Making of the Maithili Movement
MITHILESH KUMAR JHA
1
1

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Endorsement
Language Politics and Public Sphere in North
India: Making of the Maithili Movement
Mithilesh Kumar Jha
Print publication date: 2018
Print ISBN-13: 9780199479344
Published to Oxford Scholarship Online: April 2019
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780199479344.001.0001
Endorsement
Mithilesh Kumar Jha
(p.ii) ‘A “language” may be a “dialect” with an army, but the historical,
political, social, and conceptual processes involved in the transformation
from the one to the other are far deeper than that famous quip allows. Few
examples of such transformation in India are more salient than that of
Maithili. Mithilesh Kumar Jha’s thoughtful study shows that the army can
be an imaginary one, but no less powerful for that.’
—Sheldon Pollock, Arvind Raghunathan Professor,
Sanskrit and South Asian Studies,
Columbia University, New York, USA
‘This is an incisive and meticulous work that adds to the growing body of
work on language politics, especially in the context of Hindi expansionism
and its effort to colonize other vibrant and flourishing linguistic cultures
like Maithili. It also tells us a larger story of the uncertain origins of
languages and their fluid trajectories—seen for instance in Maithili’s close
relationship with Bangla and Ahomiya on the one hand, and Hindi on the
other.’
—Aditya Nigam, Professor,
Centre for the Study of Developing Societies,
New Delhi, India
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Endorsement
‘An important and much needed work on the relationship of modern Hindi
to Maithili, a richly literary language that it sought to reduce to “dialect”
status in its own aspiration to be recognized as [a] national language. Jha’s
detailed and meticulous work on the history of the movement to restore
status to Maithili is exemplary, opening the way for further studies on
related languages that have suffered similar suppression.’
—Vasudha Dalmia, Professor Emerita,
Department of South and Southeast Asian Studies,
University of California, Berkeley, USA
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Page 2 of 2
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2020. All Rights Reserved. An individual user may print out a PDF of a single chapter of a monograph in OSO for personal use. 
Subscriber: University of Sussex; date: 28 August 2020
Maps, Images, and Tables
Maps
I.1 A Map of India Showing Language Families and ‘Dialects’ 21
1.1 A Map of India Exhibiting the Extent to which Its Various
Languages Are Spoken, 1822 41
Images
3.1 Cover Page of M ithila Portraying the Interrelationships
between B harat Mata and M aa Janaki 115
3.2 Mithila Mihir: Mithilank 132
3.3 A Specimen of M ithilalkshara —1 136
3.4 A Specimen of M ithilalkshara—2 137
3.5 Maithili Sahitya Parishadak Triteeya Karya Vivaran 138
3.6 The Case of Maithili before the Patna University 141
3.7 A Chart of the Modern Indian Vernaculars 143
4.1 Kolkata Mei Maithili : Purvottar Maithil Samaj 172
4.2 Order of the Government of Bihar Regarding the Use of
Maithili as the Medium of Instruction in Primary Education 213
4.3 Protest for the Constitutional Recognition of Maithili—1 226
4.4 Protest for the Constitutional Recognition of Maithili—2 227
x Maps, Images, and Tables
4.5 Protest for the Constitutional Recognition of Maithili—3 227
4.6 Protest for the Constitutional Recognition of Maithili—4 228
4.7 Protest for the Constitutional Recognition of Maithili—5 229
4.8 Protest for the Constitutional Recognition of Maithili—6 230
Tables
4.1 Census Figures for Maithili 183
4.2 Regional Disparities between North and South Bihar 193
4.3 Speakers of Different Languages in Bihar 212
Acknowledgements
Writing this book has been a wonderful and very enriching jour-
ney both intellectual and emotional, for me. In due course of
my research for this book, I have had the opportunities to interact and
converse with a great many number of scholars, writers, and activists.
I have greatly benefi tted from their knowledge and their keen interest
in my research always motivated me to undertake my work earnestly. I
offer my heartiest thanks to all of them.
Above all, I wish to thank my PhD supervisor P.K. Datta. He has been
a constant support. Without his able guidance and intriguing questions
it would not have been possible for me to complete this work. He
had not only enriched my understanding of the issue involved in this
research with his extremely important and apt suggestions and com-
ments but also have been a great support in developing the thesis into
a publishable manuscript. I am greatly indebted to him.
Aditya Nigam and Veena Naregal have been great mentors through-
out. They have enriched my thinking about the language issue in India
and also the political and sociocultural aspects of this problem. They
had always found time for me whenever I approached them and took
keen interest in my research progress. I sincerely thank both of them.
I am also grateful to Nivedita Menon and Ravikant for their interests
in my research. Menon Ma’am (as I call her) has always enlightened
me. It is no exaggeration to say that she has been a great source of inspi-
ration for many of us and has taught us the ethics of doing research.
Ravikant too helped me in various ways not only with his critical
xii Acknowledgements
remarks and insights but also by suggesting some absolutely critical
works on my research problem. I am greatly indebted to both of them.
At different points of time, I have discussed my research progress
with Ujjwal Kumar Singh, Bidyut Chakrabarty, Madhulika Banerjee,
Satyajit Singh, Ashok Acharya, N. Sukumar, Saroj Giri, Mollica Dastider,
Rajesh Dev, Sohini Guha, and Devika Sharma. I sincerely thank all of
them for their comments, feedback, and suggestions.
I am grateful to Paul R. Brass for giving me an opportunity to discuss
with him my research work. I have also benefi tted from the valuable
suggestions by Hetukar Jha, Uday Narayan Singh, Rakesh Pandey, Bhim
Nath Jha, Amarnath Jha ‘Bakshi’, and Sadan Jha. I sincerely thank all
of them for their interests in my work and their valuable suggestions.
I am also grateful to Ashok Dansana with whom I have shared light
and diffi cult moments of research. I thank Lalit for his support at dif-
ferent stages of my work and help in translating many paragraphs from
Maithili into English. I am also grateful to Kamal Nayan Chaubey,
Indrajeet Jha, Anurag Pandey, Awanish Kumar, Pankaj Kumar Jha,
Narrotam Vinit, Vinit Kumar, and Neeraj Mishra. They have always sup-
ported me. Particularly Kamal Nayan Chaubey, who has been a great
support with his critical suggestions and feedback. I am also very grate-
ful to my friends—Amarjyoti Mahanta, Debapriya Basu, Amit Kumar
Sharma, Sushant Kumar Verma, Virendra Kumar, Chakravarti Mahajan,
Chhatrapal, Santosh, Anusha Singh, Santana Khanikar, Subarta, Amya,
Neelam, Avantika, Rinki, Devarati, Shivali, Vikramaditya, Kunal, Smriti,
Kapil, Animesh Mohapatra, Narendra, Digvijoy, Faizal, Awadhesh,
Sandeep, Heemanshu Shekhar Gogoi, and others. I always cherish their
friendship. I warmly thank all of them.
I am grateful to the University of Delhi for granting me the University
Teaching Assistantship that gave me the opportunity to teach in the
Department of Political Science. I am also grateful to the University
Grants Commission for Junior Research Fellowship and Senior Research
Fellowship during the course of my PhD.
I am also very grateful to the Charles Wallace India Trust and the
Indian Council of Social Science Research, New Delhi, for providing
me a scholarship to visit London for a short duration in August–
September 2012. It gave me the opportunity to consult the India Offi ce
Records Library at British Library, United Kingdom, which proved to be
a great help in my research. It also gave me an opportunity to interact