Kumbakonam, Cheats, Pariahs, and Conversion

Can anyone be implicated in India for using an English word? This question might appear strange for many readers in this forum. The answer is yes. Once the maverick politician Dr.Subramaniam Swamy was issued a non bailable warrant, for using a well known word in a well known context.

He was referring to LTTE, the dreaded terrorist organisation as an international pariah, after it was proscribed by many countries. When he rubbed the then chief minister Jayalalithaa on the wrong side, his above statement on LTTE was used against him. He was sued for having used the word "pariah" denoting a scheduled caste of Tamil Nadu and a warrant was issued. Dr.Subramaniam Swamy had to run for cover till he got the warrant cancelled by a higher court. Subsequently in a press conference he vowed to strive to eliminate the word 'Pariah" connoting untouchable, exile, recluse etc from the English dictionary

There are many words of foreign origin adopted by English, perhaps which makes the language very versatile. Recently few words of "Inglish" were included in the Oxford dictionary, such as "prepone" and "airdash", very liberally used by all Indian-English newspapers and until they were included in the dictionary, I never knew they were not proper English.

I do not know whether the word "Pariah" has been removed from English usage, but certainly another word, which was used liberally by the earlier generation of white settlers in India, has become extinct.

The word was "kumbakonam", which is the name of a town in Tanjavur district of Tamil Nadu, but associated in a wrong way. The word "kumbakonam" had a negative meaning conveying deceit, cheat etc and the word is used even till date in Andhra Pradesh conveying the same meaning. Some time back the word was used in All India Radio news bulletin; kicking up lot of dust, when Vijayabaskara Reddy tried to topple NTR, taking advantage of his absence to US for treatment. The news bulletin referred it as "Kumbakonam jarikindhi" - meaning a devious plan of switching the loyalty of MLAs of TDP to Congress led by Vijayabaskara Reddy.

When I enquired for answers of how Kumbakonam and deceit were associated, only one answer from an octogenarian retired from Railways was convincing. He said during British period, Railways was controlled by English officers and promotion to higher rank was denied for deserving Indians for they belonged to Hindu religion. Conversion to Christianity was a precondition laid for promotion and few persons belonging to Brahmin community got themselves converted to Christianity to claim promotion.

After enjoying all perquisites associated with Railways officers, these people one by one reconverted back to Hindu fold on retirement. Having got beaten in their own game, English have associated Kumbakonam with cheats and it stayed for long in usage, until removed.