The ongoing tweets and trolls about Flipkart being racist towards The "Gorkhas" is pouring on my newsfeed like anything else. This is not the first time, we Gorkhas are presented as “chowkidaars”. I’m completely against it, thereby condemning Flipkart in the most possible harsh words. They tend to disrespect the Gorkhas and “the khukuri”- which infact represents the Gorkha culture- which symbolizes our bravery. But, I have a question for everyone, do we, Gorkhas, have respect for our own culture???
I see many teenagers, mostly college students, they act like they have no knowledge about Nepali. They tend to speak it as some alien language. It's good that our brothers and sisters have a good knowledge about English.Well, that doesn’t mean speaking in Nepali will degrade your reputation or leave a mark of "uneducated"in thyself.
Once, I came across a group of ladies conversing over their children- one lady was casually telling – “mero chori le tah Nepali jandaina”- I was quite surprised and asked myself,"Would that same lady confess, that her daughter is weak in English??" We have a false concept of superiority of English language over vernaculars.I have no enemity towards English language, infact not knowing English would make us suffer, but not knowing Nepali would make our culture disappear. It wouldn't make one a Gorkha anymore. It is quite rightly said that “WHEN LANGUAGE DISAPPEARS, CULTURE STARTS TO STAGNANT”
Today’s generation, we have no idea who Narayan Gopal or Aruna Lama is. Literary works of our Legends like Devkota, Bhanu Bhakta are diminishing. Nepali movies are looked upon as boring and irrelevant. Wearing “dawra suruwal” makes you look old fashioned! Is this so? This is our culture , these things cannot be ignored. I’m not trying to say one has to read and understand the texts of our literary legends, or one has to wear a “dawra suruwal".But these things are a part of our culture, and being a Gorkha we should at least have a little knowledge and respect towards them. I feel that Bhanu Bhakta should be highlighted equally as Tagore. If Tagore is the Bengali icon, then Bhanu Bhakta is ours. Look at the Bengali community: Tagore wrote “Gitanjali” some 100 years back but still they worship him and have immense respect towards him. This is because their parents passed this legacy to their children and in fact this is how culture is preserved.
But we Gorkhas are falling behind in this aspect. I’m not being biased towards any culture but when we ourselves have no respect towards our own culture, we cannot expect anyone to respect it.
Vivek Pradhan
Agree with your words. Absolutely well written, a min. before was writing my words as an anti flipkart. You have rightly highlited the fact where we lack.
ReplyDeleteBought every word wittten Vivek!Racism springs from the lie that a bunch of people are less than fully human, it is a self centred thought that corrupts our mind into believing that we are right to treat others as we would not want to be treated and the cause is directly related to economy is what I feel,people are desperate and scared and in the process they scapegoat people,regardless of all the awareness and fight back its existence is undeniable and the only way to fix it is through solidarity.
ReplyDeleteSuper words awesome highlights..dammi bro...aabo chai sathiharusangha English bolda Tero post ko yaad aawxha...
ReplyDeleteNicely compiled!
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