Uphold the Mother Language in Kashmir

Human development includes various factors and among these is the mother language or mother tongue.A human being learns to communicate with the people around him with the language that is spoken by the group or community into which he is born.He learns to express his feelings as a child and responds to stimuli in that language.In the formative years of his childhood a child inculcates the mannerisms and habits through his mother language.Mother language has special significance in the civilised societies all over the globe.It is not restricted to the evolved societies and advanced civilisations but there are communities that don’t have scripts but they communicate in the sign languages and the spoken languages only.This is how human civilisation has marched and contributed to the ever progressive world order.It wont be an exaggeration if we say that mother language of any community or ethnic group is its ancient heritage and inheritance.But over the decades there has been the emergence of various challenges that have engulfed the mother languages and led to their decline in the usage and this has led to many adverse effects.The primary impact has been the depletion of the original ideas and thoughts that is the mainstay of human development and genius.When any ethnic groups is made to give up its mother language and forced to communicate in a language other than the mother language from childhood,it leads to corruption of intellect and destroys the originality of the child’s behaviour and cognition.For example,when a Kashmiri child is made to speak English by training him to wish other people or ask for small things then he is subjected to a dilemma.As the human mind is like a processors ,it gets confused and suffers a kind of a confusion to respond to these artificial stimuli.This leads to a kind of a brainwash where a child has to adapt to a language that is not spoken primarily at his home.This destroys his though process and at the same time alienates from his cultural moorings.And thus paves the way for his deviation from the mother language.In Kashmir the literary tradtion has been immense.The scholrs of Kashmir have carved a niche for themselves from the ancient times.In the ancient Kashmir,Sanskrit was the common language that acted as the root of Kashmir and later on it got corrupted and the terms were adapted accordingly.Kashmir Trika Shaiv system is an acknowledged agamic methodology that shaped the tolerance and vision of Kashmiris.That is why Kashmir produced eminent exponets of this system namely Utpaladeva,Abhinavagupta,Swami Ram Ji Maharaj and Swami Lakshman Ji.Not only that the hstorians of international repute like Kalhana, Srivara, Jonraja, Prgyabhatta, Shuka.All of them wrote the consecutive Rajataranginis documenting the place consciousness and aesthetics of Kashmir.It is proper to mention that the literary corpus of Kashmir exists to this day in the indigenous script of Kashmir that is Sharda. Sanskrit was written in Sharda script in Kashmir.With the passage of time Kashmir witnessed the rule of various rulers who made their advent to Kashmir from outside and there started another period introducing Persian and Urdu. But Kashmiris have been progressive people who drank knowledge from all the fountains.Common man’s language Kashmiri didn’t lose its sheen as the saints of Kashmir used the Kashmiri that had the impact on all sections of the people.The tallest figure among the saints of Kashmir is the Shaiva Yogini Lalleshwari who composed her vaaks in the Sanskritised Kashmiri and made the impact on the collective psyche of all the Kashmiris.We cannot forget the contribution of the peoples poets like Ahad Zargar,Wahab Khar and Habba Khatoon and the saint poets of Bhakti tradition like Paramanand ,Krishan Joo Razdan. The list goes on and on. Today we need to resolve that Kashmiris of all hues will strive to uphold their mother tongue or mother language Kashmiri in both the scripts. Be it Devanagri or Nastaliq as a humble tribute tour illustrious ancestors who were pioneers and made Kashmir the crown of knowledge civilization.