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Dear Chandan/Ram/Rajen/MKD/Mike et al Asam Sahitya Sabha has the best credentials possible as a broad-based democratic institution. It has been active since 1917 when it was founded. It is dedicated to preserving and promoting indigenous languages and cultures of Assam and is apolitical. Its branches are spread over the entire state. It connects the grassroots to the academia and intelligentsia. I am a lifelong member of the Sabha and precluded from criticising the organisation without following certain procedure. But I have no hesitation in saying that the organisation lacks vitality and effervescence. It has not seen the light of the post-Victorian era. It is in a way like the near bankrupt football clubs of UK which could survive only with sponsors like Al Fayed or that Russian tycoon G….whose name I cannot recollect properly at the moment. I have not done any studies on the origin and development of the Assamese language. If my commonsense is anything to go by, I would say that the Assamese language cannot exist without its Sanskrit base. Just one example. In English when a new word has to be coined for a new discovery, say for Medicine, the experts resort to Latin or other classical languages. The advantage of this process is that one can understand the new word without having to open the dictionary. Likewise, Indian languages depend on Sanskrit. You may not come across numerous examples of this in an Assamese newspaper. Read Ananda Bazar Patrika and you will understand what I am saying. Love and regards |
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