Sindhi is an ancient language, over seventy percent of the Sindhi words are Sanskrit. The fact that
Sindhi is mostly written in the Arabic script, gives some people the impression that it is a Persio-Arabic tongue.
Professor E. Trumpp in his monumental `Sindhi Alphabet and Grammar' (1812) writes: "Sindhi is a
pure Sanskritical language, more free from foreign elements than any of the North Indian vernaculars."
The Rev. Mr.G. Shirt of Hyderabad, one of the first Sindhi scholars, considered that the language is probably, so far as its grammatical construction is concerned, the purest daughter of Sanskrit. It has small sprinkling of Dravidian words, and has in later times received large accessions to its vocabulary from Arabic and Persian.
Sindhi is a very sweet and melodious language. Writes Dr. Annemarie Schimmel, Harvard professor of Islamics, and versatile linguist: "Since every word in Sindhi ends in a vowel, the sound is very musical."
Sindhi is a very rich language with a vast vocabulary; this has made it a favourite of many writers and so a lot of literature and poetry has been written in Sindhi. Writes K. R. Malkani in "THE SINDH STORY": 'The Sindhi language and literature reflect the rich variety and quality of Sindhi life and thought. Sindhi has 125 names for as many varieties of fish. From Hyderabad to the sea, a distance of less than one hundred miles, the Sindhu river has half a dozen names --- Sahu, Sita, Mograh, Popat, Bano, and Hajamiro --- to reflect its many moods. The camel has a score of names, to indicate its age, colour, gait and character.'
It is the language of Saints and Rishis of ancient Sindh. It has been the inspiration for Sindhi art, music, literature, culture and the way of life. Many great poets and literatis have been profoundly inspired by the beauty of Sindhi language.
The treasures of the ancient Sindhi Literature, of the immortal Sufi poet-saints: "Shah", "Sachal", "Sami" , or the Saints of Modern India: Sadhu T.L.Vaswani, Dada J.P.Vaswani, sung in sweet, melodious, rhythmic Sindhi tunes, fills the hearts and souls of the listeners with sheer rapture, joy and ecstasy.
Dada J.P.Vaswani says: The Sindhis dont have a land, nation or state to call their own. They are a scattered community, spread all over India, and in most countries of the world. If there is one thing that will help us to retain our identity, it is our language. Unfortunately Sindhis have neglected their mother tongue, and if we dont use the language, we will lose it. Language is the root of our community. Language is the Soul of our community. If the soul goes away, how long will can the community last?
Sindh is a repository of varied cultural values and has remained the seat of civilization and meeting point of diverse cultures from times immemorial. Sindh’s cultural life has been shaped, to a large extent, by its comparative isolation in the past from the rest of the subcontinent. A long stretch of desert to its east and a mountainous terrain to the west served as barriers, while the Arabian Sea in the south and the Indus in the north prevented easy access.
As a result, the people of Sindh developed their own exclusive artistic tradition. Their arts and craft, music and literature, games and sports have retained their original flavor. Sindh is rich in exquisite pottery, variegated glazed tiles, lacquer-work, leather and straw products, needlework, quilts, embroidery, hand print making and textile design. According to renowned European historian H.T. Sorelay, Sindhis had not only contributed to literature but also to astronomy, medicine, philosophy, dialectics and similar subjects.
Genuine love for fellow beings, large heartedness and hospitality constitute the very spirit of Sindhi culture and it is the association of the cultural elements that elevate it and keep aloft its banner among the contemporary cultures of South-Asia. Having lived for centuries under the changing sway of various dynasties i.e. the Arabs, Mughals, Arghuns, Turkhans and Soomras, Sammahs, Kalhoras and Talpurs, Sindhi culture is a fusion of multiple culture patterns.
Origins
Sindhi language has evolved over a period of two millennia; with many waves of invasions by Greeks, Arabs, Arghuns, Tarkhans, Seythians, Turks, Mughals and so on. Sindh, on the north west of undivided India, had always been the first to bear the onslaught of the never-ending invaders, and as such absorbed Hindi, Persian, Arabic, Turkish, English and even Portuguese. The language of the people of Sindh has a solid base of Prakrit and Sanskrit, showing great susceptibility towards borrowings from Arabic, Persian, and Dravidian (such as Brahui in Baluchistan).
Sindh was the seat of the ancient Indus valley civilization during the third millennium BC as discovered from the Moen-jo-Daro excavation. The pictographic seals and clay tablets obtained from these excavations still await proper decipherment by epigraphists. For more about the Language of Mohenjodaro: click here.
The Sindhi parlance has witnessed a transition over the years and there are varying theories related to the ancestry of the language. Historians working hard to fathom the origin of the language have varying conclusions to offer.
Facts and discoveries of Sindhi parlances over the years have launched a debate about the Sindhi language being a derivative of the ancient Sanskrit dialect and there a few historians who believe that it's the other way round. Dr Ernest Trumpp was the pioneer of the theory that Sindhi is a derivative of Sanskrit language. Judging from its vocabulary and roots of verbs, Dr Trumpp came to the conclusion that "Sindhi is a pure Sanskritical language, more free from foreign elements than any of the North Indian vernaculars."
The Rev. Mr.G. Shirt of Hyderabad, one of the first Sindhi scholars, considered that the language is probably, so far as its grammatical construction is concerned, the purest daughter of Sanskrit. It has small sprinkling of Dravidian words, and has in later times received large accessions to its vocabulary from Arabic and Persian.
Hindu scholars Dr. H M Gurbaxani and Berumal Maharchand Advani agreed with the concept. But Miss Popati Hiranandani in her book 'Sindhis: The scattered treasure' (pg6) has an interesting deliberation to this theory. According to her some scholars confused the words prakrita (meaning=natural) with the word purakrita (meaning - formed first), which misled them. In the same way, she says, due to affinity towards Hinduism, litterateurs like Kishinchand Jetley translated a couplet from Sindhi poet Shah Abdul Latif's poetry into Sanskrit and concluded that the similarity shows the derivation of Sindhi from Sanskrit. She rightly argues that it could be the other way round too and cites two authorities to elucidate this point. One is Siraj-ul-Haq of Pakistan who states:
"The history of Sindhi is older than that of Sanskrit and its related civilization or culture are derived from the civilization or culture of Sindh and from Sindhi language…Sanskrit is born of Sindhi - if not directly, at least indirectly."
The other is an Indian linguist, S Kandappan who says:
"Sindhi is one of the ancient languages. I say it is the most ancient languages, I know it has got its origin even before Sanskrit in the country…."
Interestingly, after further studies Dr Trumpp himself seemed to be doubtful about his findings. Testimonies to this are the remarks in one of his work of arts:
"Sindhi has remained steady in the first stage of decomposition after the old Prakrit, where all other cognate dialects have sunk some degrees deeper and we shall see in the course of our introductory remarks that rule, which the Prakrit grammarian, Kramdishvara has laid down in reference to the Apabramsha, are still recognizable in present day Sindhi, which by no means can be stated of the other dialects. The Sindhi has thus become an independent language, which, though sharing a common origin with its sister tongues, is very materially different from them."
Dr Trumpp's initial theory was first challenged by Dr. Nabibux Baloch. He believes that Sindhi belongs to the Semitic group. Mr. Ali Nawaz Jatoi holds the same view. They point out that there are some words in Sindhi that cannot be found in Sanskrit. Besides, the suffixes added to the pronouns in Sindhi suggest its relation with Semitic languages. The word 'Sanskrit' itself denotes that it is a polished or refined form of a language that was already prevalent. The grammarians Patanjali and Panini formed rules and regulations, which came to be necessarily, and compulsorily followed by writers and poets of those days. Thus, Sanskrit was only the language of literature as is evident from works of classical writers. Dr Baloch states:
"Sindhi is an ancient Indo-Aryan language, probably having its origin in a pre-Sanskrit Indo-Aryan Indus Valley language. The Lahnda and Kashmiri appear to be its cognate sisters with a common Dardic element in them all."
Sir George Grierson too places Sindhi as a near relative of the Dardic languages. (Dardistan is a region near Kashmir).
Literature
Sindh is where Persian and Indian cultures blended, for the area was introduced to Islam in 712AD. Thus, very little of Sindhi literature of the earlier period has survived. The Summara and Summa periods are virtually blank except for the few poems of Hamad, Raju and Isack. The heroic ballads of this period set to music by Shah Abdul Karim (1538-1625) are the earliest records of the Sindhi language.
Real flourish of Sindhi poetic talent came during the last stages of the 18th century. Although the time was not appropriate for cultural developments as invaders repeatedly plundered the country during this period. Several works like Shah Abdul Latif's Shah-Jo-Rasalo, the magnum opus of Sindhi literature, were produced.
It describes the life of a common man, the sorrows and sufferings of the ill-starred heroes of ancient folklore. Sachal, another eminent, poet closely followed Shah Abdul Karim. He was a Sufi rebel poet who did not adhere to any religion and denounced religious radicals. The poet Saami was a complete contrast to Kari, more pious than poetical, yet possessing a charm of his own. There was an excess of songsters in Sindhi who recited similar ideas and themes in varied tones. The notables among them are Bedil, his son Bekas, and Dalpat. Gul Mohamad introduced Persian forms of poetry replacing the native baits and Kafees. Mirza Kaleech Beg who composed on the same lines contributed a lot to Sindhi literature.
Dayaram Gidumal and Mirza Kaleech were two of the early prose writers. The former was a great scholar and he was famous mainly for his metaphysical writings. The noted lexicographer and essayist Parmanand Mewaram wrote essays that educated and instructed both the young and the old. This peer group also comprised of Bherumal Meherchand, Lalchand Amardinomal and Jethmal Parsram, and Acharya Gidwani, N. R. Malkani and Dr H. M. Gurbuxani.
Genetic classification: Indo-European
Indo-Iranian
Indo-Aryan
Northwestern Zone
Official language of: Pakistan, India
Sindhi language:
Sindhi is the language of the Sindh region of South Asia, which is now a province of Pakistan. It is an Indo-Aryan language spoken by approximately 17 million people in Pakistan, and 2.8 million in India; it is also a recognised official language in both of these countries.
Most Sindhi speakers in Pakistan are concentrated in Sindh. The remaining speakers are found spread throughout the many areas of the world (mainly other parts of India) to which members of an ethnic group migrated when Sindh became a part of Pakistan during the partition of British India in 1947. The language can be written using the Devanagari or Arabic scripts.
Geographical distribution:
Sindhi is taught as a first language in the schools of south-east Pakistan, except in large metropolises like Karachi. Sindhi language has a vast vocabulary; this has made it a favourite of many writers and so a lot of literature and poetry has been written in Sindhi.
In India:
Sindhi is one of the major literary languages of India recognized in the Eighth Schedule of the Constitution. It is spoken by a large number of people who, after migration from Sindhi due to partition of the country in 1947 have settled mainly in Gujarat, Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh and Delhi. Significant number of Sindhi speaking people reside in South India and in some other regions of the country. Among the modern Indian language, Sindhi is the only language which is not an official language of any particular state. Hence being a stateless language, special efforts are required for its growth and preservation of its literary heritage.
Sindhi speech is generally classified into six major dialects:
i. Siraiki, spoken in Siro, i.e. Upper Sindh
ii. Vicholi, in Vicholo, Central Sindh
iii. Lari, in Laru, i.e. Lower Sindh
iv. Lasi, in Lasa B’elo, a part of Kohistan in Baluchistan on the western side of Sindh
v. Thari or Thareli, in Tharu, the desert region on the southeast border of Sindh and a part of the Jaisalmer district in Rajasthan
vi. Kachhi, in the Kutch region and in a part of Kathiawar in Gujarat, on the southern side of Sindh.
Vicholi is considered as the standard dialect by all Sindhi speakers. It is commonly used among the educated class and is accepted as the language of literature and education (also for administration in Sindh, Pakistan). The largest Sindhi-speaking city is Hyderabad, Pakistan.
Sounds:
Sindhi has a very rich sound inventory. It has 46 distinctive consonant phonemes (more than all the phonemes of English combined) and a further 10 vowels. All plosives, affricates, nasals, the retroflex flap and the lateral approximant /l/ have aspirated or breathy voiced counterparts. The language also features four seperate implosives.
Thattai
Khudabadi
Luhaniki
Memonki
Khojiki
Devnagri
Gurmukhi
Hatkai (Hatvaniki).
Even 300 years after the Arab conquest, at the time of Mahmud Ghazni, Al-Biruni, historian, found three scripts current --- Ardhanagari, Saindhu and Malwari, all variations of Devnagri.
When the British arrived, they found the Pandits writing Sindhi in Devnagri. Traders --- including Khojas and Memons --- were using a variety of "Modi" or "Vanika" scripts, without any vowels. Hindu women were using Gurmukhi and government employees, some kind of Arabic script.
British scholars found the language Sanskritic and said that the Devnagri script would be right for it. In 1849 they produced an English-Sindhi dictionary in Devnagri. A year later they translated the Bible in Sindhi, again in the Devnagri script. Government servants, many of whom were Hindus, favoured the Arabic script, since they did not know Devnagri, and had to learn it anew.
A big debate started, with Capt. Burton favouring the Arabic script and Capt. Stack favouring Devnagri. Sir Bartle Frere, the Commissioner of Sindh, referred the matter to the Court of Directors of the British East India Company, which favoured Arabic on the ground that Muslim names could not be written in Devnagri.
Sir Richard Burton, an orientalist, with the help of local scholars Munshi Thanwardas and Mirza Sadiq Ali Beg evolved a 52-letter Sindhi alphabet. Since the Arabic script could not express many Sindhi sounds, a scheme of dots was worked out for the purpose. As a result, the Sindhi script today not only has all its own sounds, but also all the four Z's of Arabic.
The present script predominantly used in Sindh as well as in many states in India and elsewhere where migrant Sindhis have settled, is Arabic in Naskh styles having fifty two alphabets. However, in some circles in India, Devanagari is used for writing Sindhi. The Government of India recognizes both scripts.
Technical Characteristics Sindhi Alphabet
The graphic representation of each alphabet has more than one form depending on its position. In general each letter has four forms: beginning, middle, final and standalone.
Phonology:
The phonological system of Sindhi in most respects resembles that of other Indo-Aryan languages. Sindhi has 53 distinct sound-units: 39 consonants, 3 semivowels, 10 vowels, and a unit of nasalization.
Segmental phonemes
The Sindhi consonant system consists of 25 stops (including 4 palatal-affricates), 5 nasals, 6 fricatives and 3 liquids. Consonantal sounds show five-fold contrast in the place of articulation: labial, dental, retroflex, palatal and velar.
Sindhi has the fullest stop system of any of the Indo- Aryan languages. The stop series shows contrast between voicing and unvoicing, aspiration and pressure and suction.
A series of four implosive stops – (bbe, DDe, jje, gge : in sounding them breath is drawn in instead of being expelled as in be, De, je, ge) is a striking characteristic of Sindhi phonology.
In Sindhi vao, ye, he function similarly to consonants in initial and certain medial positions. But in final postion and also medially when preceeding or following a consonant, these occur as vocalic glides; thus forming dipthongs with preceding or following vowels; these are classified as semivowels.
Sindhi has a ten-vowel system, showing three-fold contrast in the tongue-position: front, central and back; and five-fold contrast in the tongue-height: high, lower-high, lower-mid and low. Every vowel has a nasalized counterpart in the language.
Syllables
Syllable division in a word is predictable in Sindhi. Word stress is also predicted on the strength of the syllable structure. Sindhi is primarily an open-syllable language, i.e. syllables mostly end with a vowel or semivowel. Words in Sindhi mostly have vocalic ending and the occurrence of consonant cluster is also sporadic in the language. Close syllables are very infrequent in the language.
A syllable in Sindhi consists of at least one vowel or at most five sound units, in which one is a vowel and others are non-vocalic sounds (consonants or semivowels preceding or following the vowel). Open syllable with a single consonant (CV) are most frequent in the language.
Stress
In Sindhi, stress has only a limited use of demarcating words and putting emphasis on a particular word in an utterance. There are three main stresses: word stress, emphatic stress and drawled stress.
Writing Systems
The Sindhi-Devanagari script is adapted from the Sanskrit system of
writing. Each character in the Devanagari system represents a syllable.
It consists of either a vowel or a consonant followed by the vowel.
Devanagari characters are written from left to right.
Character Set Considerations
Characteristics
The alphabet of Sindhi is a super set of Arabic, Persian and Urdu languages, and contains 52 basic characters. Additionally there are a few diacritic marks, numerals, and punctuations.
Special characters :
Letters(and), and(in) are also used in text.
Sindhi numerals are similar to Urdu. Numerals are written left to
right. The decimal separator in Urdu numerals is called "ASHARYA"
(U+066B) and is similar to "HAMZA" in shape. A dot may also be used in
place of "ASHARYA".
Fonts
Considering the Arabic script, as mentioned earlier, that it being used for writing Sindhi, calligraphic shapes, multiple alternate shapes are possible for a single letter. The shape is determined by the position of the character in a word and/or character next to it.
Character Cell Size
The characters cell height is fixed and can be controlled. The script is a linear script and line height of text can be fixed.
Glyphs to be supported in Sindhi Fonts:
All the basic shapes plus alternate shapes required for a character have to be provided. A single character thus would have at least four or more glyphs for it. The diacritic marks along with special symbols used are provided. The numerals, and punctuations are also provided.
Aa-ee taando khanan, Borchyaani thee vethee (She came only to borrow a charcoal, but remained to take full charge of the kitchen)
Aah gareebaa kair khudaayee (if the down trodden cry in pain for the harm inflicted upon them, then God Himself takes revenge.)
Aahey ta Eed na ta Rozo (if one is financially sound, then one eats well, like one does during the festival of "Eed". If one, on the other hand is not economically comfortable, then one must perforce fast like during "Roza".)
Abo gasey dheeya vasey (that fathers have to work very hard so that their daughters prosper.)(dowry related)
Ahraa suhinaa toohaa ta jangal mein bhee ahan (beautiful "toohaa" flowers abound in the jungle.)
Aj hamaan, Subhaaney tamaan (today I suffer, tomorrow you might be the sufferer.)
Akul khaaey gam or Gam Khaaiendein, Sukh Paaendein (the wise one swallows ones pain and pride knowing the reward will be peace of mind )
Allah rusey mat khasey (What happens when God is unhappy with you? you lose you good sense.)
Amaanat mein khyaanat na kajey (if someone gives one something for safe-keeping, one must honorably return it when the time came.)
Ba bhaur tyon lekho (where there are two brothers, a written document (of finance and properties) must exist.)
Baanee saayee jee saayee, Gaayee bukhyey jo bukhyo (those who are honest will never want even though they may be cheated)
Bandey jey man mein hikri, Sahib jey man mein bee (Man Proposes, God disposes)
Budyal beri maan, Loh bhee chango (whatever one is able to salvage from a bad debt is good. Hence if a ship drowns, salvage the iron.)
Chao dhiya khey, Ta sikhey noonha or Dhak hanh dhiya khey, Ta sikhey noonha (If you instruct your daughter, your daughter-in-law learns.)
Charee jo chooro, Kadheen tanga mein, Kadheen baanh mein (a crazy woman wears a bangle, sometimes on her wrist and sometimes on her leg. This proverbs is pointing to the fickle nature of an unstable woman.)
Chintaa chikhyaa samaan (worry is like death.)
Chor jee maau, Kund mein rooey (the mother of the thief, cries in a corner. This proverb implies that the mother of a guilty one cannot share her grief with anyone, and hence cries alone)
Daaney daaney tey mohir. (that every grain of food is stamped with the name of the eater.)
Deraanyoon veraanyoon, satan janman khaan viryal (sister's in -law (wives of brothers), continue to remain enemies since the last seven generations even though they probably stayed and ate together.)
Ditho sab visaar, Undithey khey yaad kar (one must forget what one has seen, and look towards the unseen future)
Doita vadhandey very (the children from ones daughter were never close enough to their maternal grand-parents, however much the latter pampered the kids.)
Eendo sabko disey, vendo disey kon (People have a way of noticing how much money comes into the house, but they generally never keep count of how much goes into expenditure.)
Ehro kam kajey, Jo laal labhey, Ain preet bhee rehjee achey ( one should act in such a manner that we find the sought for gem and we continue to retain the friendship.)
Gareeb jee joy, jag jee bhaajaayee (the wife of a poor man is like a brother's wife to the world. I believe that the above means that just like a brother's wife was supposed to serve one with respect, so was a poor man's wife.)
Ghar ghoran khey, Baara choran khey (for daughters in law or/and wives who spend enough time following their own pursuits: the house has been left to the horses, and the children have been left under the care of thieves.)
Ghar jee gahpee, Matan jo panee sukaayey chhadey (arguments in a house can get so hot, that they are capable of drying up the water in the earthen pots.)
Ghar jo kin, Ghar mein dhopjey (one must wash ones dirty laundry at home.)
Ghar mein ghar, Budee vanee mar (if your extended joint families live under the same roof, you are as good as dead.)
Gur jaaney, Gur jee gothree jaaney (only the person who is in the situation is aware of his own pain)
Hikree latey sau patey (one door closes, another hundred open.)
Jabal khey thyaa soora jaayee kuyee (the mountain had labor pains, but only a mouse took birth.)
Jahaan jeeyu tahaan sikhu (there is no end to learning, and that while one continues to live one continues to learn.)
Jainh khaado taro, Tainh khey nako soor nako baro. (if one eats the food from the bottom of the saucepan, one will not suffer from pain or humiliation. It implies that it pays to be humble.)
Jainjo khaaibo, Tainjo gaaibo (one must appreciate and praise, those who feed you and/or do you a favour.)
Jainkhey dinyoon jaayoon, Tinsaan kahryoon baayoon (once one has given ones daughters in marriage, one cannot get angry with her new family.)
Jeda utha, Teda loda (The bigger the camel, the bigger the jerks it experiences.)
Jeeyu khush ta jahaan khush (Laugh and the world laughs with you)
Jeko chul tey, So dil tey (one is always more fond of those members of ones family with who one lives and eats together.)
Jeko daadho so gaabo (he who stands his ground, eventually wins.)
Jinjo hitey khap, Tinjo hutey bhi khap (Literally means: Those who are most needed on earth, Seem to be needed by God as well. Or, Those people who are needed, die sooner than we would like them to.)
Kadheen kadheen akhyoon bi dokho khaayee vanyan (sometimes ones own eyes deceive us)
Karz vado marz (owing debts is like suffering from a bad disease.)
Khaado khaaey, Ta akhiyoon lajayeen (if you partake of somebody's food, you feel embarrassed until you reciprocate the favor.)
Khaado khaaibo ta khangbo bhee (while eating, you will be sometimes forced to clear your throat.)
Khushee jairee khuraak koney, gantee jairo marz koney (there is no nourishment like joy, and no disease is worse than worry.)
Kini aangur vadhee bhalee (it is better to cut a bad finger. ( Rather than the poison spreads).)
Koylan jey dalaalee mein, hatha bhee kaaraa, Ta per bhee kaaraa (if you work in a coal mine, your hands and feet are bound to get soiled.)
Kuey ladhee haid garee, Chavey aaon pasaaree (a mouse found a piece of turmeric, and claims to own a grocery store.)
Labhey lath na, Babo bandookan vaaro (he is a type of person who does not even own a stick, and he claims to be a master of guns.)
Lachmi vaney ta lachhan bi vanan (What happens when wealth bids adieu? Sometimes it takes your good qualities with it.)
Maaran vaarey khaan, Rakhan vaaro vado aahey (God, the Protector is greater than he who wants to harm you)
Maau jee dil makhan, Puta jee dil pathar (a mother's heart is soft as butter while the heart of the son is made of stone.)
Mau janeendi putraa, Bhaag na deendi vandey (though a mother gives birth and life to children, yet she cannot divide the same destiny equally amongst them.)
Moor khaan vyaaj mitho (the interest is always more enjoyable than the principal amount, thereby implying that one tends to love ones grand-children more than their parents.)
Moorakh jey khushaamad khaan, Syaaney jee tok bhalee (it is better to be criticized by a wise man rather than be praised by a fool.)
Murs ta phado, Na ta jado (unless a husband is hard to please, he is not good enough.)
Na dijey na dukhoyjey (Do not give, if you must hurt the person later.")
Naadaan dost khaan, Daanav dushman chango (it is better to have a wise enemy than a foolish friend.)
Naani radhan vaaree, Doitaa khaain vaaraa (maternal grand-children eat while the grand-mother toils and cooks.)
Naarey binaa nar vegaano (without money man feels alone and dejected.)
Naathee dingee kaathee (son-in-law is compared to a crooked stick.)
Nayee kwaanr nava deenha, Chhikey taaney daha deenha (a bride remains a new bride for 9 days, and at the most for 10 days. This proverb probably means that a bride gets to rest for 9 days after which she starts her domestic duties.)
Nekee karey daryaa mein vijh (after having performed a good deed, drop the thought of it into the sea.)( your right hand does a good deed, your left hand should not get to know about it.)
Noree maan naang karan (There are people, who do nothing but exaggerate. Sindhis said that such people convert a rope into a snake.) (Storm in a teacup)
Pahanjey gatee, Pau gaday khey pere (for ones benefit, one sometimes should pamper a donkey (a fool).)
Parayo pyo, ghar vyo (when an intruder enters ones house, he may be the cause of the destruction of ones home.)
Putu thyey maal bhai, Dheeya thyey haal bhai (a son shares you properties and possessions whereas a daughter partakes of your joys and sorrows.)
Saa-ey maan sau sukha (one can derive a lot of benefit from the fortunate ones.)
Sab aangriyoon baraabar konan (all fingers are not of the same size or shape.)
Sabur jo phal mitho aahey (that patience brings a sweet reward.) perseverance brings to ones destiny a fruit that is sweet.)
Sach ta vetho nach (If you speak the truth you can continue to dance with joy. In other words, if you speak the truth, you can enjoy peace as there is no fear of you contradicting yourself.)
Sakhi khaan shoom bhalo, Jo turt dyey javaab (he is better, who promptly says "No" to a proposition, rather than the one who says "Yes" to proposals, and then goes on to resent the same.)
Sakhini kunee ghano ubhaamey (an empty vessel bubbles more, or makes the most sound.)
Sas kaath jee bi suthee (though a mother-in-law be hard as wood , she is good to have around, as during times of need she would always be there to extend a helping hand.)
Savar aahir per digheran (one should live according to ones means.)
Sena akhyun jaa nena (the in-laws of ones off-spring, are as dear to one, as ones own eye pupils.)
Sheedi siki vyaa soonha khaan, Maan siki vyas siyaani noonha khaan (the dark-skinned people yearn for a fair complexion, whereas I long for a sensible daughter-in-law.)
Soorat khaan seerat bhali (it is better to have uprightness, rather than possess good looks. )
Taari hik hathee kon vajandee aahey (one cannot clap with one hand . It implies that wherever there is an argument, all parties are probably to blame to a certain extent.)
Thado gharo paan khey paaneyee chhaaon mein vyaarey (a cool pot of water seats itself in the shade. It implies that if one stays composed one stays out of conflict.)
Thoro disee araao na thijey, Ghano disee sarao na thijey (For peace of mind: one should not to be distressed, when one possesses less, and not be proud when one has much.
Turt daan, Maha kalyaan (if you execute your duty promptly, it is equivalent to performing a good deed.)
Turt kam maha punya (if you execute your duty promptly, it is equivalent to performing a good deed.)
Uhaayee zibaan ussa mein vyaarey, Uhaayee zibaan chhaaon mein vyaarey (the same tongue makes you sit under the sun and it is the same tongue that makes you sit in the shade.)
Uhey hath roti mein, Uhey hath choti mein (people who take up too many tasks at one time, are like those who use the same hands to knead dough, and the same hands to plait their hair.)
Uheyee hatha neer mein, Uheyee hatha kheer mein (at times life doles out two tasks at the same time. One provides pain, and the other gives joy.)
Uho sone hi ghoryo, Jo kana chhiney (those golden earrings are not worthy of possession if they are too heavy and tear your ears.)
Un-herya na her, mataan hirani, Heryaan na pher mataan phiranee (one should not get someone used to constant favors done out of goodwill, because when you stop doing them the benefaction, they might turn against one.)
Vandey viraayey sukh paaye (sharing what one has with ones brethren , gives happiness.)
Vethee huyee ruthee, Mathaan aayus peko maanoo (She was sitting annoyed and upset, and to make it worse, came someone to visit from her family.)
Vyaaj aahey Soortee ghoro (interest is like a racing horse.)
Vyaaj raat jo bhee pandh karey (interest "runs" which implies that it augments even during the night.)
Tatoon khe taro, kazi khe isharo
Jite Lobhi hujhan, utey thogi bukha na maran
Hika hatha mein ba gidra kone khani saghanda.
Anil Balchandani writes:
BRIEF: Here is an article I found, to my surprise, in the Indo-American News, a small Houston based weekly. It talks about some of the better known Sindhi Hindu families and their accomplishments against adversity.
The Business of Being Sindhi
The Sindhi community, uprooted during India’s partition, now girdles the globe and figures prominently in business enterprises worldwide.
By Sifra Samuel Lentin
"There’s a joke that when man first lands on Mars he’ll find a Sindhi shop. Furthermore the shopkeeper will already have staked out his territory on the Red Planet."
The teller of the joke is Indian businessman Srichand Hinduja, 62, whose family of indefatigable traders is one of the best known in India.
The Sunday Times, a British newspaper, recently ranked Srichand, alongside his brother Gopichand, 55, as Britain’s 11th richest man, with an estimated net worth of 1.7billion. Beyond that, they are the chief representatives of the Sindhi community, 250,000 of whom were uprooted from their homeland in modern Pakistan and forced to virtually reinvent themselves after India’s Partition in 1947.
The joke hides a bitter reality. Today, fifty years after the exodus, the Sindhis, who trace their roots back 5,600 years to the Indus valley civilization, are a stateless people.
Partition divided the sub-continent and overnight, Sind with its bustling capitals of Karachi and Hyderabad, joined Pakistan.
In the enormous exchange of populations that took place soon after India won independence from Britain, the enterprising seafaring Sindhis, many of them Hindus marooned in a Muslim land, left their homes to come to largely Hindu India. Only a very few were able to carry away with them anything more than the clothes on their backs.
Today, the Sindhi network girdles the globe, stretching from Japan, Singapore and Hong Kong through the Middle East to Africa and Gibraltar, and across Britain and Europe to the U.S. and Latin America. "We lost considerably with Partition" said Narain Kimatrai, 60, whose mercantile family forced to flee its magnificent ancestral home in Hyderabad.
"While the Muslim Sindhis were unaffected," said his wife, Shakun Narain Kimatrai, 53, who grew up in Spain but wrote four books on Sindhi culture and religion, "We lost our homeland and have never heard Sindhi spoken on the streets again." Some were saved by their overseas business enterprises. "Sindhis like our family had diversified even before Partition," Hinduja said. "Since 1919 we shifted to Bombay and only a small part of our assets were in Shikarpur (Pakistan)."
In the years that followed, as India adopted a closed socialist model of economic development, the Hindujas went on to make their fortunes trading in Iran.
Yet others travelled further afield and rose to prominence in different nations - B.K. Murjani and Dr. Hari Harilela in Hong Kong, Manubhai Madhvani (sindhi?) in Uganda, Tan Sri Kishu Tirathrai in Malaysia, Chief Harkishin B. Chanrai in Nigeria.
"The first overseas J.Kimatrai & Co. office was established in Rangoon (Burma) in 1896," said Kimatrai. "Thereafter, we had many branches worldwide." These networks needed trusted personnel to man them, and so a wave of relatives joined the diaspora.
In India, Sindhis are widely perceived as having an inborn flair for business. "The interest earned on wealth is like a good racing horse," is a favorite Sindhi proverb.
"We have always been known to go out and make a buck," said Manhattan-based businessman Mithoo Mahtani.
But all through their years of wandering, the Sindhis have clutched tightly to family, cultural and social ties. "I believe Sindhis will never lose their identity because they firmly believe in their culture and religious identity," Hinduja said.
ORIGINS AND ESTABLISHMENT OF THE INDIAN BUSINESS COMMUNITY IN MALTA§
Mark-Anthony Falzon*
Introduction
The Hindu Sindhis
Sindworkis in Malta: Tourism and the Trade in ‘Curios’
Table 1
Sindwork Firms Operating in Malta during Given Periods of
Review, and Number of Relative Personnel
The Sindhis, I believe, have a rich contribution to make to the thought and life of India and Humanity. We are children of one of the most ancient civilisations of the world - the Indus Valley Civilisation.
Ancient is the civilisation to which the Sindhis belong. When the Aryans came to India and stood on the banks of the mighty river Indus, they exclaimed in sheer wonder, "Sindhu! Sindhu!" The word 'Sindhu' appears in a number of hymns in the oldest Scripture of humanity, the Rigveda. The Sindhu (Indus) valley civilisation is at least 7,000 years old. And India was originally called, "Sindhustan" the " Land of the Sindhu". My regret is that many Sindhis - scattered, as they are, all over India and the world - are unaware of rich heritage which belongs to them.
Ancient History
The South Asian region is separated from the rest of Asia by a wall of ranges - the Hindu Kush, the Sulaiman, the Karakoram and the Himalayas. Below these are the seemingly endless plains drained by the Indus, the Ganges and the Brahmaputra rivers.
In the geological youth of the world, the entire subcontinent was part of the ocean bed. Its ring of mountains was a wall of cliff-shored islands holding back the waves from the Asian heartland as they now hold back the monsoon clouds. The ocean receded; the bed became fertile plain. Rivers began to find their way to the now distant ocean. The longest of three great sub continental rivers is the Indus, now in Pakistan, then Sind. The river has given its name to a country and a religion- ironically, not the country through which it flows or the religion of the people who live by its waters. It is fed by many streams from the mountains of Tibet, the Soviet Union, and Afghanistan. Five other major rivers flows into the Indus: the Jhelum, Chenab, Ravi, Sutlej, and Beas.
This essay is about the people who live along these waters and the people who live in the desserts deprived of these waters. They speak many languages- Urdu, Punjabi, Sindhi, Pashto, Baluchi, Brahui, Gujrati, to name some - reflecting the diversity of their historical and cultural experience. The people of the Indus live in four provinces of Pakistan. They are the products of unnumbered historical permutations and combinations, the fusion and clashes of fifty-five centuries of civilisation.
In the 1920s an expedition of the Indian Archaeological Survey under Sir John Marshall excavated an interesting mound of earth in the Sind region of then British India. The locals called this particular earthy protuberance Mohan-jo-daro - "the place of the dead." Sir John and his -party discovered one of the world's most ancient cities beneath it. Up to that time the ancient settled areas along the Tigris-Euphrates and the Nile River systems had seemed to merit the title of "cradle of civilisation" - now the Indus was making its claim and new theories had to be devised.
Other sites were investigated, and the cities of the Indus Valley were unearthed - Harappa, Chanhu-daro, Lothal, Kot Diji-highly developed cities that told of a civilisation which had began around 3000 BC, reached apex by 2000, and completely perished by 1000 B.C.
The remains excavated in Mohan-jo-Daro depict the state of affairs from civilisation point of view at that period. These Aryans in Sindh virtually the Indus Valley are mentioned in history of having played role in the battle of Hastinapur when King Jaidrath took his army to support the Kurus. The Sindhis rule the Sindh till they were defeated and conquered by the Arabs in the seventh century. And from that time onwards they played the role of refugees.
Recent Past
With the Partition in 1947 they have had to leave their home and have spread themselves out in every part of the world. And they still continue to be refugees. Though they are refugees driven away from their home they are again with their own Aryans who had spread out in parts of the country. The brother Aryans kept the banner of Sindh alive by including their identity in the National Song and recognizing as a positive community whose future lies in recovering the land of their birth and supporting the country as they did in the battle of Hastinapur. For at that time we learnt that we were part of the central government ruled by Duryodhana.
When, due to the partition of India, the Sindhis were dispossessed of their lands and properties, they did not give into despair. Leaving their properties and possessions in Sindh, they migrated to India, bringing with themselves their enterprising sprit, their faith in God and their many qualities of head and heart. In Sindh, there was never a Sindhu beggar. When they come to India, they resolved that they would starve rather than beg. Little boys attended school during the day and in the afternoon, kept themselves busy hawking on the streets or in railway trains.
Of the great German mathematician, Dr. Jaccobi, it is said that one day he was asked why he had sacrificed so much and devoted all his time and energies to the development of the arithmetic theory, he replied: - "For the honour of the human spirit!"
Of Maharaj Prakash Bhardwaj it may rightly be said that he has strained every nerve, labored long and untiringly - all for the honor of Sindhi community. He has already given us two monumental volumes in the "Sindhi through the Ages" series. And now he presents us with this magnificent publication, 'Sindhis' International Yearbook (1841-1990).
The Rev. Mr.G. Shirt of Hyderabad, one of the first Sindhi scholars, considered that the language is probably, so far as its grammatical construction is concerned, the purest daughter of Sanskrit. It has small sprinkling of Dravidian words, and has in later times received large accessions to its vocabulary from Arabic and Persian.
Sindhi is a very sweet and melodious language. Writes Dr. Annemarie Schimmel, Harvard professor of Islamics, and versatile linguist: "Since every word in Sindhi ends in a vowel, the sound is very musical."
Sindhi is a very rich language with a vast vocabulary; this has made it a favourite of many writers and so a lot of literature and poetry has been written in Sindhi. Writes K. R. Malkani in "THE SINDH STORY": 'The Sindhi language and literature reflect the rich variety and quality of Sindhi life and thought. Sindhi has 125 names for as many varieties of fish. From Hyderabad to the sea, a distance of less than one hundred miles, the Sindhu river has half a dozen names --- Sahu, Sita, Mograh, Popat, Bano, and Hajamiro --- to reflect its many moods. The camel has a score of names, to indicate its age, colour, gait and character.'
It is the language of Saints and Rishis of ancient Sindh. It has been the inspiration for Sindhi art, music, literature, culture and the way of life. Many great poets and literatis have been profoundly inspired by the beauty of Sindhi language.
The treasures of the ancient Sindhi Literature, of the immortal Sufi poet-saints: "Shah", "Sachal", "Sami" , or the Saints of Modern India: Sadhu T.L.Vaswani, Dada J.P.Vaswani, sung in sweet, melodious, rhythmic Sindhi tunes, fills the hearts and souls of the listeners with sheer rapture, joy and ecstasy.
Dada J.P.Vaswani says: The Sindhis dont have a land, nation or state to call their own. They are a scattered community, spread all over India, and in most countries of the world. If there is one thing that will help us to retain our identity, it is our language. Unfortunately Sindhis have neglected their mother tongue, and if we dont use the language, we will lose it. Language is the root of our community. Language is the Soul of our community. If the soul goes away, how long will can the community last?
HISTORY
CultureSindh is a repository of varied cultural values and has remained the seat of civilization and meeting point of diverse cultures from times immemorial. Sindh’s cultural life has been shaped, to a large extent, by its comparative isolation in the past from the rest of the subcontinent. A long stretch of desert to its east and a mountainous terrain to the west served as barriers, while the Arabian Sea in the south and the Indus in the north prevented easy access.
As a result, the people of Sindh developed their own exclusive artistic tradition. Their arts and craft, music and literature, games and sports have retained their original flavor. Sindh is rich in exquisite pottery, variegated glazed tiles, lacquer-work, leather and straw products, needlework, quilts, embroidery, hand print making and textile design. According to renowned European historian H.T. Sorelay, Sindhis had not only contributed to literature but also to astronomy, medicine, philosophy, dialectics and similar subjects.
Genuine love for fellow beings, large heartedness and hospitality constitute the very spirit of Sindhi culture and it is the association of the cultural elements that elevate it and keep aloft its banner among the contemporary cultures of South-Asia. Having lived for centuries under the changing sway of various dynasties i.e. the Arabs, Mughals, Arghuns, Turkhans and Soomras, Sammahs, Kalhoras and Talpurs, Sindhi culture is a fusion of multiple culture patterns.
Origins
Sindhi language has evolved over a period of two millennia; with many waves of invasions by Greeks, Arabs, Arghuns, Tarkhans, Seythians, Turks, Mughals and so on. Sindh, on the north west of undivided India, had always been the first to bear the onslaught of the never-ending invaders, and as such absorbed Hindi, Persian, Arabic, Turkish, English and even Portuguese. The language of the people of Sindh has a solid base of Prakrit and Sanskrit, showing great susceptibility towards borrowings from Arabic, Persian, and Dravidian (such as Brahui in Baluchistan).
Sindh was the seat of the ancient Indus valley civilization during the third millennium BC as discovered from the Moen-jo-Daro excavation. The pictographic seals and clay tablets obtained from these excavations still await proper decipherment by epigraphists. For more about the Language of Mohenjodaro: click here.
The Sindhi parlance has witnessed a transition over the years and there are varying theories related to the ancestry of the language. Historians working hard to fathom the origin of the language have varying conclusions to offer.
Facts and discoveries of Sindhi parlances over the years have launched a debate about the Sindhi language being a derivative of the ancient Sanskrit dialect and there a few historians who believe that it's the other way round. Dr Ernest Trumpp was the pioneer of the theory that Sindhi is a derivative of Sanskrit language. Judging from its vocabulary and roots of verbs, Dr Trumpp came to the conclusion that "Sindhi is a pure Sanskritical language, more free from foreign elements than any of the North Indian vernaculars."
The Rev. Mr.G. Shirt of Hyderabad, one of the first Sindhi scholars, considered that the language is probably, so far as its grammatical construction is concerned, the purest daughter of Sanskrit. It has small sprinkling of Dravidian words, and has in later times received large accessions to its vocabulary from Arabic and Persian.
Hindu scholars Dr. H M Gurbaxani and Berumal Maharchand Advani agreed with the concept. But Miss Popati Hiranandani in her book 'Sindhis: The scattered treasure' (pg6) has an interesting deliberation to this theory. According to her some scholars confused the words prakrita (meaning=natural) with the word purakrita (meaning - formed first), which misled them. In the same way, she says, due to affinity towards Hinduism, litterateurs like Kishinchand Jetley translated a couplet from Sindhi poet Shah Abdul Latif's poetry into Sanskrit and concluded that the similarity shows the derivation of Sindhi from Sanskrit. She rightly argues that it could be the other way round too and cites two authorities to elucidate this point. One is Siraj-ul-Haq of Pakistan who states:
"The history of Sindhi is older than that of Sanskrit and its related civilization or culture are derived from the civilization or culture of Sindh and from Sindhi language…Sanskrit is born of Sindhi - if not directly, at least indirectly."
The other is an Indian linguist, S Kandappan who says:
"Sindhi is one of the ancient languages. I say it is the most ancient languages, I know it has got its origin even before Sanskrit in the country…."
Interestingly, after further studies Dr Trumpp himself seemed to be doubtful about his findings. Testimonies to this are the remarks in one of his work of arts:
"Sindhi has remained steady in the first stage of decomposition after the old Prakrit, where all other cognate dialects have sunk some degrees deeper and we shall see in the course of our introductory remarks that rule, which the Prakrit grammarian, Kramdishvara has laid down in reference to the Apabramsha, are still recognizable in present day Sindhi, which by no means can be stated of the other dialects. The Sindhi has thus become an independent language, which, though sharing a common origin with its sister tongues, is very materially different from them."
Dr Trumpp's initial theory was first challenged by Dr. Nabibux Baloch. He believes that Sindhi belongs to the Semitic group. Mr. Ali Nawaz Jatoi holds the same view. They point out that there are some words in Sindhi that cannot be found in Sanskrit. Besides, the suffixes added to the pronouns in Sindhi suggest its relation with Semitic languages. The word 'Sanskrit' itself denotes that it is a polished or refined form of a language that was already prevalent. The grammarians Patanjali and Panini formed rules and regulations, which came to be necessarily, and compulsorily followed by writers and poets of those days. Thus, Sanskrit was only the language of literature as is evident from works of classical writers. Dr Baloch states:
"Sindhi is an ancient Indo-Aryan language, probably having its origin in a pre-Sanskrit Indo-Aryan Indus Valley language. The Lahnda and Kashmiri appear to be its cognate sisters with a common Dardic element in them all."
Sir George Grierson too places Sindhi as a near relative of the Dardic languages. (Dardistan is a region near Kashmir).
Literature
Sindh is where Persian and Indian cultures blended, for the area was introduced to Islam in 712AD. Thus, very little of Sindhi literature of the earlier period has survived. The Summara and Summa periods are virtually blank except for the few poems of Hamad, Raju and Isack. The heroic ballads of this period set to music by Shah Abdul Karim (1538-1625) are the earliest records of the Sindhi language.
Real flourish of Sindhi poetic talent came during the last stages of the 18th century. Although the time was not appropriate for cultural developments as invaders repeatedly plundered the country during this period. Several works like Shah Abdul Latif's Shah-Jo-Rasalo, the magnum opus of Sindhi literature, were produced.
It describes the life of a common man, the sorrows and sufferings of the ill-starred heroes of ancient folklore. Sachal, another eminent, poet closely followed Shah Abdul Karim. He was a Sufi rebel poet who did not adhere to any religion and denounced religious radicals. The poet Saami was a complete contrast to Kari, more pious than poetical, yet possessing a charm of his own. There was an excess of songsters in Sindhi who recited similar ideas and themes in varied tones. The notables among them are Bedil, his son Bekas, and Dalpat. Gul Mohamad introduced Persian forms of poetry replacing the native baits and Kafees. Mirza Kaleech Beg who composed on the same lines contributed a lot to Sindhi literature.
Dayaram Gidumal and Mirza Kaleech were two of the early prose writers. The former was a great scholar and he was famous mainly for his metaphysical writings. The noted lexicographer and essayist Parmanand Mewaram wrote essays that educated and instructed both the young and the old. This peer group also comprised of Bherumal Meherchand, Lalchand Amardinomal and Jethmal Parsram, and Acharya Gidwani, N. R. Malkani and Dr H. M. Gurbuxani.
LANGUAGE
Indo-Iranian
Indo-Aryan
Northwestern Zone
Official language of: Pakistan, India
Sindhi language:
Sindhi is the language of the Sindh region of South Asia, which is now a province of Pakistan. It is an Indo-Aryan language spoken by approximately 17 million people in Pakistan, and 2.8 million in India; it is also a recognised official language in both of these countries.
Most Sindhi speakers in Pakistan are concentrated in Sindh. The remaining speakers are found spread throughout the many areas of the world (mainly other parts of India) to which members of an ethnic group migrated when Sindh became a part of Pakistan during the partition of British India in 1947. The language can be written using the Devanagari or Arabic scripts.
Geographical distribution:
Sindhi is taught as a first language in the schools of south-east Pakistan, except in large metropolises like Karachi. Sindhi language has a vast vocabulary; this has made it a favourite of many writers and so a lot of literature and poetry has been written in Sindhi.
In India:
Sindhi is one of the major literary languages of India recognized in the Eighth Schedule of the Constitution. It is spoken by a large number of people who, after migration from Sindhi due to partition of the country in 1947 have settled mainly in Gujarat, Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh and Delhi. Significant number of Sindhi speaking people reside in South India and in some other regions of the country. Among the modern Indian language, Sindhi is the only language which is not an official language of any particular state. Hence being a stateless language, special efforts are required for its growth and preservation of its literary heritage.
Sindhi speech is generally classified into six major dialects:
i. Siraiki, spoken in Siro, i.e. Upper Sindh
ii. Vicholi, in Vicholo, Central Sindh
iii. Lari, in Laru, i.e. Lower Sindh
iv. Lasi, in Lasa B’elo, a part of Kohistan in Baluchistan on the western side of Sindh
v. Thari or Thareli, in Tharu, the desert region on the southeast border of Sindh and a part of the Jaisalmer district in Rajasthan
vi. Kachhi, in the Kutch region and in a part of Kathiawar in Gujarat, on the southern side of Sindh.
Vicholi is considered as the standard dialect by all Sindhi speakers. It is commonly used among the educated class and is accepted as the language of literature and education (also for administration in Sindh, Pakistan). The largest Sindhi-speaking city is Hyderabad, Pakistan.
Sounds:
Sindhi has a very rich sound inventory. It has 46 distinctive consonant phonemes (more than all the phonemes of English combined) and a further 10 vowels. All plosives, affricates, nasals, the retroflex flap and the lateral approximant /l/ have aspirated or breathy voiced counterparts. The language also features four seperate implosives.
SCRIPT
Origins:
What was the original script of Sindhi? Sindhi lacked an authentic script/alphabet. It was either written in more than eight different scripts:Thattai
Khudabadi
Luhaniki
Memonki
Khojiki
Devnagri
Gurmukhi
Hatkai (Hatvaniki).
Even 300 years after the Arab conquest, at the time of Mahmud Ghazni, Al-Biruni, historian, found three scripts current --- Ardhanagari, Saindhu and Malwari, all variations of Devnagri.
When the British arrived, they found the Pandits writing Sindhi in Devnagri. Traders --- including Khojas and Memons --- were using a variety of "Modi" or "Vanika" scripts, without any vowels. Hindu women were using Gurmukhi and government employees, some kind of Arabic script.
British scholars found the language Sanskritic and said that the Devnagri script would be right for it. In 1849 they produced an English-Sindhi dictionary in Devnagri. A year later they translated the Bible in Sindhi, again in the Devnagri script. Government servants, many of whom were Hindus, favoured the Arabic script, since they did not know Devnagri, and had to learn it anew.
A big debate started, with Capt. Burton favouring the Arabic script and Capt. Stack favouring Devnagri. Sir Bartle Frere, the Commissioner of Sindh, referred the matter to the Court of Directors of the British East India Company, which favoured Arabic on the ground that Muslim names could not be written in Devnagri.
Sir Richard Burton, an orientalist, with the help of local scholars Munshi Thanwardas and Mirza Sadiq Ali Beg evolved a 52-letter Sindhi alphabet. Since the Arabic script could not express many Sindhi sounds, a scheme of dots was worked out for the purpose. As a result, the Sindhi script today not only has all its own sounds, but also all the four Z's of Arabic.
The present script predominantly used in Sindh as well as in many states in India and elsewhere where migrant Sindhis have settled, is Arabic in Naskh styles having fifty two alphabets. However, in some circles in India, Devanagari is used for writing Sindhi. The Government of India recognizes both scripts.
Technical Characteristics Sindhi Alphabet
The graphic representation of each alphabet has more than one form depending on its position. In general each letter has four forms: beginning, middle, final and standalone.
Phonology:
The phonological system of Sindhi in most respects resembles that of other Indo-Aryan languages. Sindhi has 53 distinct sound-units: 39 consonants, 3 semivowels, 10 vowels, and a unit of nasalization.
Segmental phonemes
The Sindhi consonant system consists of 25 stops (including 4 palatal-affricates), 5 nasals, 6 fricatives and 3 liquids. Consonantal sounds show five-fold contrast in the place of articulation: labial, dental, retroflex, palatal and velar.
Sindhi has the fullest stop system of any of the Indo- Aryan languages. The stop series shows contrast between voicing and unvoicing, aspiration and pressure and suction.
A series of four implosive stops – (bbe, DDe, jje, gge : in sounding them breath is drawn in instead of being expelled as in be, De, je, ge) is a striking characteristic of Sindhi phonology.
In Sindhi vao, ye, he function similarly to consonants in initial and certain medial positions. But in final postion and also medially when preceeding or following a consonant, these occur as vocalic glides; thus forming dipthongs with preceding or following vowels; these are classified as semivowels.
Sindhi has a ten-vowel system, showing three-fold contrast in the tongue-position: front, central and back; and five-fold contrast in the tongue-height: high, lower-high, lower-mid and low. Every vowel has a nasalized counterpart in the language.
Syllables
Syllable division in a word is predictable in Sindhi. Word stress is also predicted on the strength of the syllable structure. Sindhi is primarily an open-syllable language, i.e. syllables mostly end with a vowel or semivowel. Words in Sindhi mostly have vocalic ending and the occurrence of consonant cluster is also sporadic in the language. Close syllables are very infrequent in the language.
A syllable in Sindhi consists of at least one vowel or at most five sound units, in which one is a vowel and others are non-vocalic sounds (consonants or semivowels preceding or following the vowel). Open syllable with a single consonant (CV) are most frequent in the language.
Stress
In Sindhi, stress has only a limited use of demarcating words and putting emphasis on a particular word in an utterance. There are three main stresses: word stress, emphatic stress and drawled stress.
Writing Systems
Sindhi-Devanagri Script
Character Set Considerations
Characteristics
The alphabet of Sindhi is a super set of Arabic, Persian and Urdu languages, and contains 52 basic characters. Additionally there are a few diacritic marks, numerals, and punctuations.
Special characters :
Letters(and), and(in) are also used in text.
Sindhi Numerals
Fonts
Considering the Arabic script, as mentioned earlier, that it being used for writing Sindhi, calligraphic shapes, multiple alternate shapes are possible for a single letter. The shape is determined by the position of the character in a word and/or character next to it.
Character Cell Size
The characters cell height is fixed and can be controlled. The script is a linear script and line height of text can be fixed.
Glyphs to be supported in Sindhi Fonts:
All the basic shapes plus alternate shapes required for a character have to be provided. A single character thus would have at least four or more glyphs for it. The diacritic marks along with special symbols used are provided. The numerals, and punctuations are also provided.
SINDHI PROVERBS
Aah gareebaa kair khudaayee (if the down trodden cry in pain for the harm inflicted upon them, then God Himself takes revenge.)
Aahey ta Eed na ta Rozo (if one is financially sound, then one eats well, like one does during the festival of "Eed". If one, on the other hand is not economically comfortable, then one must perforce fast like during "Roza".)
Abo gasey dheeya vasey (that fathers have to work very hard so that their daughters prosper.)(dowry related)
Ahraa suhinaa toohaa ta jangal mein bhee ahan (beautiful "toohaa" flowers abound in the jungle.)
Aj hamaan, Subhaaney tamaan (today I suffer, tomorrow you might be the sufferer.)
Akul khaaey gam or Gam Khaaiendein, Sukh Paaendein (the wise one swallows ones pain and pride knowing the reward will be peace of mind )
Allah rusey mat khasey (What happens when God is unhappy with you? you lose you good sense.)
Amaanat mein khyaanat na kajey (if someone gives one something for safe-keeping, one must honorably return it when the time came.)
Ba bhaur tyon lekho (where there are two brothers, a written document (of finance and properties) must exist.)
Baanee saayee jee saayee, Gaayee bukhyey jo bukhyo (those who are honest will never want even though they may be cheated)
Bandey jey man mein hikri, Sahib jey man mein bee (Man Proposes, God disposes)
Budyal beri maan, Loh bhee chango (whatever one is able to salvage from a bad debt is good. Hence if a ship drowns, salvage the iron.)
Chao dhiya khey, Ta sikhey noonha or Dhak hanh dhiya khey, Ta sikhey noonha (If you instruct your daughter, your daughter-in-law learns.)
Charee jo chooro, Kadheen tanga mein, Kadheen baanh mein (a crazy woman wears a bangle, sometimes on her wrist and sometimes on her leg. This proverbs is pointing to the fickle nature of an unstable woman.)
Chintaa chikhyaa samaan (worry is like death.)
Chor jee maau, Kund mein rooey (the mother of the thief, cries in a corner. This proverb implies that the mother of a guilty one cannot share her grief with anyone, and hence cries alone)
Daaney daaney tey mohir. (that every grain of food is stamped with the name of the eater.)
Deraanyoon veraanyoon, satan janman khaan viryal (sister's in -law (wives of brothers), continue to remain enemies since the last seven generations even though they probably stayed and ate together.)
Ditho sab visaar, Undithey khey yaad kar (one must forget what one has seen, and look towards the unseen future)
Doita vadhandey very (the children from ones daughter were never close enough to their maternal grand-parents, however much the latter pampered the kids.)
Eendo sabko disey, vendo disey kon (People have a way of noticing how much money comes into the house, but they generally never keep count of how much goes into expenditure.)
Ehro kam kajey, Jo laal labhey, Ain preet bhee rehjee achey ( one should act in such a manner that we find the sought for gem and we continue to retain the friendship.)
Gareeb jee joy, jag jee bhaajaayee (the wife of a poor man is like a brother's wife to the world. I believe that the above means that just like a brother's wife was supposed to serve one with respect, so was a poor man's wife.)
Ghar ghoran khey, Baara choran khey (for daughters in law or/and wives who spend enough time following their own pursuits: the house has been left to the horses, and the children have been left under the care of thieves.)
Ghar jee gahpee, Matan jo panee sukaayey chhadey (arguments in a house can get so hot, that they are capable of drying up the water in the earthen pots.)
Ghar jo kin, Ghar mein dhopjey (one must wash ones dirty laundry at home.)
Ghar mein ghar, Budee vanee mar (if your extended joint families live under the same roof, you are as good as dead.)
Gur jaaney, Gur jee gothree jaaney (only the person who is in the situation is aware of his own pain)
Hikree latey sau patey (one door closes, another hundred open.)
Jabal khey thyaa soora jaayee kuyee (the mountain had labor pains, but only a mouse took birth.)
Jahaan jeeyu tahaan sikhu (there is no end to learning, and that while one continues to live one continues to learn.)
Jainh khaado taro, Tainh khey nako soor nako baro. (if one eats the food from the bottom of the saucepan, one will not suffer from pain or humiliation. It implies that it pays to be humble.)
Jainjo khaaibo, Tainjo gaaibo (one must appreciate and praise, those who feed you and/or do you a favour.)
Jainkhey dinyoon jaayoon, Tinsaan kahryoon baayoon (once one has given ones daughters in marriage, one cannot get angry with her new family.)
Jeda utha, Teda loda (The bigger the camel, the bigger the jerks it experiences.)
Jeeyu khush ta jahaan khush (Laugh and the world laughs with you)
Jeko chul tey, So dil tey (one is always more fond of those members of ones family with who one lives and eats together.)
Jeko daadho so gaabo (he who stands his ground, eventually wins.)
Jinjo hitey khap, Tinjo hutey bhi khap (Literally means: Those who are most needed on earth, Seem to be needed by God as well. Or, Those people who are needed, die sooner than we would like them to.)
Kadheen kadheen akhyoon bi dokho khaayee vanyan (sometimes ones own eyes deceive us)
Karz vado marz (owing debts is like suffering from a bad disease.)
Khaado khaaey, Ta akhiyoon lajayeen (if you partake of somebody's food, you feel embarrassed until you reciprocate the favor.)
Khaado khaaibo ta khangbo bhee (while eating, you will be sometimes forced to clear your throat.)
Khushee jairee khuraak koney, gantee jairo marz koney (there is no nourishment like joy, and no disease is worse than worry.)
Kini aangur vadhee bhalee (it is better to cut a bad finger. ( Rather than the poison spreads).)
Koylan jey dalaalee mein, hatha bhee kaaraa, Ta per bhee kaaraa (if you work in a coal mine, your hands and feet are bound to get soiled.)
Kuey ladhee haid garee, Chavey aaon pasaaree (a mouse found a piece of turmeric, and claims to own a grocery store.)
Labhey lath na, Babo bandookan vaaro (he is a type of person who does not even own a stick, and he claims to be a master of guns.)
Lachmi vaney ta lachhan bi vanan (What happens when wealth bids adieu? Sometimes it takes your good qualities with it.)
Maaran vaarey khaan, Rakhan vaaro vado aahey (God, the Protector is greater than he who wants to harm you)
Maau jee dil makhan, Puta jee dil pathar (a mother's heart is soft as butter while the heart of the son is made of stone.)
Mau janeendi putraa, Bhaag na deendi vandey (though a mother gives birth and life to children, yet she cannot divide the same destiny equally amongst them.)
Moor khaan vyaaj mitho (the interest is always more enjoyable than the principal amount, thereby implying that one tends to love ones grand-children more than their parents.)
Moorakh jey khushaamad khaan, Syaaney jee tok bhalee (it is better to be criticized by a wise man rather than be praised by a fool.)
Murs ta phado, Na ta jado (unless a husband is hard to please, he is not good enough.)
Na dijey na dukhoyjey (Do not give, if you must hurt the person later.")
Naadaan dost khaan, Daanav dushman chango (it is better to have a wise enemy than a foolish friend.)
Naani radhan vaaree, Doitaa khaain vaaraa (maternal grand-children eat while the grand-mother toils and cooks.)
Naarey binaa nar vegaano (without money man feels alone and dejected.)
Naathee dingee kaathee (son-in-law is compared to a crooked stick.)
Nayee kwaanr nava deenha, Chhikey taaney daha deenha (a bride remains a new bride for 9 days, and at the most for 10 days. This proverb probably means that a bride gets to rest for 9 days after which she starts her domestic duties.)
Nekee karey daryaa mein vijh (after having performed a good deed, drop the thought of it into the sea.)( your right hand does a good deed, your left hand should not get to know about it.)
Noree maan naang karan (There are people, who do nothing but exaggerate. Sindhis said that such people convert a rope into a snake.) (Storm in a teacup)
Pahanjey gatee, Pau gaday khey pere (for ones benefit, one sometimes should pamper a donkey (a fool).)
Parayo pyo, ghar vyo (when an intruder enters ones house, he may be the cause of the destruction of ones home.)
Putu thyey maal bhai, Dheeya thyey haal bhai (a son shares you properties and possessions whereas a daughter partakes of your joys and sorrows.)
Saa-ey maan sau sukha (one can derive a lot of benefit from the fortunate ones.)
Sab aangriyoon baraabar konan (all fingers are not of the same size or shape.)
Sabur jo phal mitho aahey (that patience brings a sweet reward.) perseverance brings to ones destiny a fruit that is sweet.)
Sach ta vetho nach (If you speak the truth you can continue to dance with joy. In other words, if you speak the truth, you can enjoy peace as there is no fear of you contradicting yourself.)
Sakhi khaan shoom bhalo, Jo turt dyey javaab (he is better, who promptly says "No" to a proposition, rather than the one who says "Yes" to proposals, and then goes on to resent the same.)
Sakhini kunee ghano ubhaamey (an empty vessel bubbles more, or makes the most sound.)
Sas kaath jee bi suthee (though a mother-in-law be hard as wood , she is good to have around, as during times of need she would always be there to extend a helping hand.)
Savar aahir per digheran (one should live according to ones means.)
Sena akhyun jaa nena (the in-laws of ones off-spring, are as dear to one, as ones own eye pupils.)
Sheedi siki vyaa soonha khaan, Maan siki vyas siyaani noonha khaan (the dark-skinned people yearn for a fair complexion, whereas I long for a sensible daughter-in-law.)
Soorat khaan seerat bhali (it is better to have uprightness, rather than possess good looks. )
Taari hik hathee kon vajandee aahey (one cannot clap with one hand . It implies that wherever there is an argument, all parties are probably to blame to a certain extent.)
Thado gharo paan khey paaneyee chhaaon mein vyaarey (a cool pot of water seats itself in the shade. It implies that if one stays composed one stays out of conflict.)
Thoro disee araao na thijey, Ghano disee sarao na thijey (For peace of mind: one should not to be distressed, when one possesses less, and not be proud when one has much.
Turt daan, Maha kalyaan (if you execute your duty promptly, it is equivalent to performing a good deed.)
Turt kam maha punya (if you execute your duty promptly, it is equivalent to performing a good deed.)
Uhaayee zibaan ussa mein vyaarey, Uhaayee zibaan chhaaon mein vyaarey (the same tongue makes you sit under the sun and it is the same tongue that makes you sit in the shade.)
Uhey hath roti mein, Uhey hath choti mein (people who take up too many tasks at one time, are like those who use the same hands to knead dough, and the same hands to plait their hair.)
Uheyee hatha neer mein, Uheyee hatha kheer mein (at times life doles out two tasks at the same time. One provides pain, and the other gives joy.)
Uho sone hi ghoryo, Jo kana chhiney (those golden earrings are not worthy of possession if they are too heavy and tear your ears.)
Un-herya na her, mataan hirani, Heryaan na pher mataan phiranee (one should not get someone used to constant favors done out of goodwill, because when you stop doing them the benefaction, they might turn against one.)
Vandey viraayey sukh paaye (sharing what one has with ones brethren , gives happiness.)
Vethee huyee ruthee, Mathaan aayus peko maanoo (She was sitting annoyed and upset, and to make it worse, came someone to visit from her family.)
Vyaaj aahey Soortee ghoro (interest is like a racing horse.)
Vyaaj raat jo bhee pandh karey (interest "runs" which implies that it augments even during the night.)
Tatoon khe taro, kazi khe isharo
Jite Lobhi hujhan, utey thogi bukha na maran
Hika hatha mein ba gidra kone khani saghanda.
SINDHI CULTURE
Roots Of Sindhi Civilization- It’s Glory & Greatness
RESEARCH & REFERENCE
CENTER
(Historical Division)
New Delhi-110016.
New Delhi-110016.
- NOTE: Rig Veda, the first and foremost of our Vedas (and the world’s
most ancient literature), hardly mentions Ganga and Yamuna rivers. Only
one late hymn mentions Ganga. For Rig Vedic poets, the river par excellence
was Sindhu, mentioned repeatedly, respectfully and glowingly, in Rig-Veda.
(This, as ‘Return of the Aryans’ explains, is said not in arrogance, for
Sindhis worship Ganga, but the fact is that the earliest songs of Hindus
were naturally about their home-ground which began with the Sind region,
as the birth-place of Hinduism).
- 1. While, research in Return of the Aryans is unassailable on
practically all aspects, the author himself points out that his presentation
of the journey of Aryans of Sind and India, to distant lands (and their
return) should be treated as alternative history, which needs to be researched
further in the light of the evidence he, and others, have unearthed.
- (Note:Mainstream historians have looked to the West as the Aryan
home-ground. The fact however is that Gidwani’s effort is backed by enormous
research of 18 years, while historians offer no evidence, apart from pointing
out 22 regions from which Aryans could possibly have emerged. The difficulty
of the mainstream historians in picking one single place from the 22 regions
is understandable. None of these regions showed the slightest link with
the high civilization and classical art and literature of Sind and India;
and even as the historians came under the spell of compelling fascination
of the Vedas, the spiritual vision of Upanishads, the philosophic content
of the Bhagvadgita and the inspiration of the enduring epics of
India, they wondered: how could it be that Aryans came from this or that
foreign region, when that region itself showed no evidence of such philosophic
development or artistic achievement or spiritual heritage? – specially
as all these flowered in India independently, and unrelated to any other
region, with no parallels or precedents elsewhere.
- (NOTE: Initially, the mainstream historians held the view that
the entire culture of India had to be refracted through the prism of Aryan
life – and that only decadence and darkness existed in the land until the
Aryans emerged to invade India. But then, after the historians had so spoken,
as Return of the Aryans points out, in one of history’s more subtle
ironies, came the excavations of Mohanjo daro, Harappa and others. These
excavations clearly pointed to a flourishing civilization that existed
thousands of years in the past, distinct from all others, independent and
deeply rooted in the Indian soil and environment. After these discoveries,
there never was a serious attempt to explain the origins of Hindu civilization
in terms of immigration or invasion from outside).
- Avagana (Afghanistan), after Sadhu Gandhara of Sind established his Ashram at a place which in his honour was called Gandhara (now known as Qandhar), and later at Hari Rath (now known as Herat). Incidentally, Gandhari of Mahabharta fame came from Gandhara or Qandhar, though it is not certain if she was a descendant of Sadhu Gandhara of Sind or simply from that region of Qandhar.
- From Afghanistan, Bharat Varsha extended to parts of Iran, beyond Lake Namaskar (now known as Namaksar), where many Hindu hermits resided;
- In North, Bharat Varsha territory went across soaring peaks of Himalayas to Tibet to reach Lake Mansarovar, Mount Kailash, upto the source of mighty Sindhu and Brahmaputra rivers, and beyond;
- Bharat Varsha included also Land of Brahma (Burma) and beyond; Kashmir; Lands of Sadhu Newar (Nepal); Bhoota (Bhutan); and Land of Vraon (Sri Lanka).
- 5. Return of the Aryans has also many other gripping tales about
Sind and Sindhis - their battles and romance, adventures and exploits,
valor and sacrifice, art and culture, well before the dawn of recorded
history. It shows clearly :
- that Sind, along with Bharat Varsha in its entirety, is the most ancient civilization in the world - more ancient than China, Japan, Mesopotamia, Iran and Egypt.
- that Sind and Bharat Varsha, were there before Rome was built, and before Jerusalem, Carthage, Greece, Damascus and Istanbul were founded.
- When Europeans lived in caves, our people along Sindhu river had two-story houses of brick and stone, with drainage system, public parks, public baths, art-works, fountains and granaries.
- Along the banks of Sindhu, our Sindhi ancestors founded the ancient order of Sanatanah, well before 8,000 BC, and again, along the banks of Sindhu, from this root of Sanatanah sprang Sanatana Dharma, the ageless religion of the Hindus.
-
6. Clearly, it has to be noted that "Return of the Aryans" is
not exclusively devoted to the glory and greatness of Sind. It also presents
the story of India as a whole, and of the birth and beginnings of Hinduism.
It speaks glowingly, lovingly of the Ganga, Dravidian and other civilizations
of India as well - and shows that they too had much to teach, as also to
learn from the people of Sindhu in regard to the marvels of irrigation,
engineering skill, broad streets, well-built houses, elegant temples, chariots,
drainage systems, granaries, boats, gardens, baths and fountains and more
so, in the field of art, culture and aesthetics.
-
7. Sindhi Hindu society has always retained its Hinduism, and essential
Hindu culture but never did it reject goodness in other cultures. For instance:
- Sindhis rejected Vedic Society’s strangle-hold of caste system, knowing that caste system was never a basic tenet of Hinduism, but merely a custom, evolved to meet a temporary situation.
- Sindhis accepted Gautama Buddha’s and Guru Nanak’s message, and their new, fresh ideas, which Hinduism is always conditioned to accept, for never was a Sindhi dogma-ridden.
-
Note: An aspect about "Return of the Aryans" needs to be stressed.
It is presented in the form of a novel, in the interest of wide readership,
which a pure historical text is unable to achieve. Even so, it sticks,
as closely as possible, to historical discovery, archaelogical finds in
India, West Asia, Europe & elsewhere, and the Memory Songs of prehistory
ancients in the traditional memory of the people of Sind, India, Angkor,
Bali, Java, Burma, China, Bhutan, Nepal, Iran, Iraq, Turkey, Egypt, Norway,
Sweden, Finland, Italy, Lithuania, and Germany.
- (Note: The local Sindhi Muslim population was keen to protect
them as, by and large, religious fanaticism was as foreign to Sindhi Muslims
as it was to Sindhi Hindus. However, refugees streaming from India into
Sind were bent on loot and genocide, while authorities remained unconcerned
over their plight, and sometimes were even collusive).
Anil Balchandani writes:
BRIEF: Here is an article I found, to my surprise, in the Indo-American News, a small Houston based weekly. It talks about some of the better known Sindhi Hindu families and their accomplishments against adversity.
The Business of Being Sindhi
The Sindhi community, uprooted during India’s partition, now girdles the globe and figures prominently in business enterprises worldwide.
By Sifra Samuel Lentin
"There’s a joke that when man first lands on Mars he’ll find a Sindhi shop. Furthermore the shopkeeper will already have staked out his territory on the Red Planet."
The teller of the joke is Indian businessman Srichand Hinduja, 62, whose family of indefatigable traders is one of the best known in India.
The Sunday Times, a British newspaper, recently ranked Srichand, alongside his brother Gopichand, 55, as Britain’s 11th richest man, with an estimated net worth of 1.7billion. Beyond that, they are the chief representatives of the Sindhi community, 250,000 of whom were uprooted from their homeland in modern Pakistan and forced to virtually reinvent themselves after India’s Partition in 1947.
The joke hides a bitter reality. Today, fifty years after the exodus, the Sindhis, who trace their roots back 5,600 years to the Indus valley civilization, are a stateless people.
Partition divided the sub-continent and overnight, Sind with its bustling capitals of Karachi and Hyderabad, joined Pakistan.
In the enormous exchange of populations that took place soon after India won independence from Britain, the enterprising seafaring Sindhis, many of them Hindus marooned in a Muslim land, left their homes to come to largely Hindu India. Only a very few were able to carry away with them anything more than the clothes on their backs.
Today, the Sindhi network girdles the globe, stretching from Japan, Singapore and Hong Kong through the Middle East to Africa and Gibraltar, and across Britain and Europe to the U.S. and Latin America. "We lost considerably with Partition" said Narain Kimatrai, 60, whose mercantile family forced to flee its magnificent ancestral home in Hyderabad.
"While the Muslim Sindhis were unaffected," said his wife, Shakun Narain Kimatrai, 53, who grew up in Spain but wrote four books on Sindhi culture and religion, "We lost our homeland and have never heard Sindhi spoken on the streets again." Some were saved by their overseas business enterprises. "Sindhis like our family had diversified even before Partition," Hinduja said. "Since 1919 we shifted to Bombay and only a small part of our assets were in Shikarpur (Pakistan)."
In the years that followed, as India adopted a closed socialist model of economic development, the Hindujas went on to make their fortunes trading in Iran.
Yet others travelled further afield and rose to prominence in different nations - B.K. Murjani and Dr. Hari Harilela in Hong Kong, Manubhai Madhvani (sindhi?) in Uganda, Tan Sri Kishu Tirathrai in Malaysia, Chief Harkishin B. Chanrai in Nigeria.
"The first overseas J.Kimatrai & Co. office was established in Rangoon (Burma) in 1896," said Kimatrai. "Thereafter, we had many branches worldwide." These networks needed trusted personnel to man them, and so a wave of relatives joined the diaspora.
In India, Sindhis are widely perceived as having an inborn flair for business. "The interest earned on wealth is like a good racing horse," is a favorite Sindhi proverb.
"We have always been known to go out and make a buck," said Manhattan-based businessman Mithoo Mahtani.
But all through their years of wandering, the Sindhis have clutched tightly to family, cultural and social ties. "I believe Sindhis will never lose their identity because they firmly believe in their culture and religious identity," Hinduja said.
ORIGINS AND ESTABLISHMENT OF THE INDIAN BUSINESS COMMUNITY IN MALTA§
Mark-Anthony Falzon*
Introduction
The Hindu Sindhis
- Petitions to the Chief Secretary of Government (CSG), 1885 to 1930.
- The word ‘jati’ may broadly be translated as ‘sub-caste’ in which case the ‘caste’ would be Hindu Sindhis as a whole. One should keep in mind however that ‘jati’ simply means ‘type’ and that in the Indian context the terms ‘caste’, ‘sub-caste’, ‘jati’, ‘ethnic group’, ‘linguistic group’, and ‘regionality’ are often used interchangeably.
Sindworkis in Malta: Tourism and the Trade in ‘Curios’
President: G.T. Shahani
A-18, Mayfair Gardens
Naturally, much of the effort of Sindhi organizations has been directed
to advancement of Sindhi community in various economic and educational
fields. However, very little has been said of ancient Sindhi culture, traditions
and heritage. The few references to Sindhi culture revolve largely around
some great and celebrated poets of recent past, such as Shah Abdul Latif
Bhittai, Sachal Sarmast, Sami and Kanwar Bhagat; but there, unfortunately,
our cultural reference rests. This is so because no serious effort has
been made to discover and analyze the roots of Sindhi civilization.
It gives me pleasure therefore to invite attention to Bhagwan S. Gidwani’s
Return of the Aryans - published in India and Canada by Penguin
Books (book number: 0-14-024053-5). This highly researched book, written
in form of a novel, brings out the glory and greatness of Sindhi culture
and heritage from pre-ancient times, even before the advent of the Vedic
era.
Mainly, Return of the Aryans is concerned with telling the story
of the birth & beginning of Hinduism, along with the dramatic account
of how Aryans originated from India (and from nowhere else); their exploits
and adventures in West Asia and Europe, including Iran, Eygpt, Mesopotamia,
Russian lands, Finland, Italy, Greece, Norway, Sweden, Lithuania &
Baltic States and Germany; and finally their triumphal return to India.
Even so, here are some of the main facts about ancient Sind, emerging from
the book.
1. BIRTH & beginning of Hinduism took place in Sind, along Sindhu river, prior to 8,000 BC.
2. It was a man from Sind who first uttered the auspicious ‘OM’ Mantra, and devised the salutation of NAMASTE, (to highlight "TAT TVAM ASI" - THAT THOU ART - or to acknowledge that "there is God in you, and to Him and to you we salute).
3. Similarly, the ‘SWASTIKA’ seal & symbol was originated in Sind to spread the message of ‘Daya, Dana & Dharma’ (Later, after the Aryan migration to Europe, ‘SWASTIKA’ came to be adopted in Europe, initially for auspicious purposes, though in the modern era, in the Nazi period, it was used for inauspicious, corrupt practices and racial hatred).
4. It was SINDHIS from SIND who discovered the routes to Ganga, Dravidian, Bangla, and other regions in 5,000 BC; and civilizations of all these regions, then, came under spiritual guidance of SIND, in a spirit of equality and mutual respect. All these regions joined together to form Bharat Varsha.
5. It was a Sindhi - he was known as Sindhu Putra – who, 7,000 years ago, was acknowledged as MAHAPATI in GANGA region to indicate his spiritual supremacy over GANGAPATI (ruler of GANGA region). Sindhu Putra was also recognized as the PERIYAR (Supreme authority) in Dravidian regions. Everywhere else too, he was honored, with highest titles and respectful submission.
6. The ancient name of Bharat Varsha was given to India to honor the memory of Bharat who was the 19th Karkarta (supreme chief) of the Hindu clan in Sind in 5000 BC, long after he retired as a hermit at the age of sixty.
7. Sind had profound influence on RIG VEDA, doctrines of KARMA; MOKSHA, AHIMSA & DHARMA; and also on the pre-ancient roots and lofty ideals of Sanatana Dharma.
8. It was along Sindhu river, that the world’s first written language or the script was evolved. They called it "the language that can be seen". Sindhi is today written in the wrong way - in Arabic script. But it is Sanskritic. 72 percent of its words were Sanskritic - till 1947. Since 1947, its Sanskritic content is being eroded by inclusion of Urdu, Persian and Arabic words.
9. Sind was one of the major home-grounds and cradle-grounds of Aryans when they left India in 5000 BC, and returned back to their home-town and heritage of Sind. The exploits and adventures of Aryans of Sind can fill a thousand volumes. Unfortunately, the way our history is written, they occupy only a tiny place in our national memory. Reservations & Explanations:
The main argument, thus far, that the Aryans originated from outside
has been that Sanskrit had many words common with Greek, Latin and all
the languages known as Indo-Iranian and Indo-European. Somehow, it did
not occur to the mainstream historians that these Western languages were
influenced by Aryans moving out of India. ‘Return of the Aryans’
clearly shows how Sanskrit went out with the Aryans of Sind and India,
and enriched the language of many regions, and was itself enriched by them.
The second argument of the mainstream historians is weaker still. It
relies on the divergence of skin-colour and the physique of the various
races in India. ‘Return of the Aryans’ clarifies at length
how this divergence arose and its irrelevance to the question of Aryans.
The third argument of the mainstream historians, was also flawed. It
referred to evidence of Aryan influence (such as Swastika) abroad, to support
the theory that Aryans came from outside. Actually this argument can be
turned around to support the thesis that Aryans of Sind and India went
to the West, and left their enduring influence there, including the imprint
of their language and some cultural affinities.
The link between the pre-ancient Hindu and Aryan should have been clear
by now, given the plethora of the clues that exist. Return of the Aryans
offers innumerable such clues, and gives a mosaic of a long-forgotten
past to show that Aryans did not belong to a different species, culture
or race; and there is an unbroken continuity – spiritual, racial, social,
and secular – between the pre-ancient civilization of Bharat Varsha and
the Aryans of 5,000 BC.
2. Further as author Gidwani adds, "I have read every word of Vedas,
Upanishads, epics, and other Aryan literature. If Aryans came from the
West, it would be amazing that they who wrote so much on so many diverse
subjects, simply forgot to mention their original homeland.")
Author Gidwani is on firm ground as he conclusively demolishes the
frivolous theory of the Aryan invasion of Sind and India. Piling evidence
on evidence, he succeeds in proving that Aryans were born, grew up and
died as Hindus, anchored in the timeless foundation of Sanatana Dharma.
The myth of Aryan invasion of India must now be regarded as entirely
untrue. Due to inertia or pride of authorship, Indian historians may have
failed to correct their earlier papers in which the myth of Aryan invasion
was mentioned. Even so, in all those earlier papers, not a shred of evidence
was ever offered to support the theory of Aryan invasion of India. It was
simply a case of each historian quoting other historians in support of
the theory, but without even a single fact or evidence.
3. It should also be noted that Bharat Varsha of 5,000 BC, formed with
Sind’s guidance, was far more extensive than the present-day territory
of India, Pakistan & Bangladesh, as it included additionally :
A Disappearing Culture?
Much of the memory of Sind’s ancient culture remained alive till 8th
Century AD when Arabs, under Mohammed Bin Qasim, conquered Sind. Raja Dahir
Sen, the last Hindu Sindhi King died on the battlefield. For centuries
thereafter, our culture remained suppressed, our books were burnt, our
temples were destroyed, our idols were smashed, and even to speak or write
about our culture earned the penalty of torture, death, or forced conversion.
As it is, majority of the population of Sind was forcibly converted to
Islam. Many, through those dark centuries, lost much of the knowledge of
our roots and ancient culture, for it was forbidden even to whisper about
it.
The successive rulers of Sind, attached as they were to foreign cultures,
also saw to it that the memory of the pre-ancient culture of Sind remains
suppressed. Even the British rulers saw wisdom in encouraging ridicule
of ancient civilization of India, lest it serves as a rallying cry for
Indian nationalism; and their historians were keen to expound the theory
that the Aryans came to India from the West , and brought culture &
enlightenment - and that only decadence and darkness existed in the land
until the Aryans of the West emerged to conquer India. Indian historians,
trained in western ways of education, readily accepted the theory, and
repeated it vehemently and frequently but without offering any evidence,
apart from quoting various others who have advanced the same theory.
With India’s independence, came the Partition of India. Sindhi Hindus
were obliged to flee from Sind, leaving their homes and property behind.
The alternative was massacre or forced conversion for most of them, if
they chose to remain in Sind.
Most Sindhi Hindus (nearly three million) found refuge in India, initially
in most difficult circumstances. Their initiative and enterprise, combined
with professional skill and hard work, have brought them prosperity. Nearly
two hundred thousand Sindhi Hindus are settled in other countries, including
U.K., USA, Hong Kong, Philippines, Singapore, Indonesia, Nigeria, Thailand,
Canada, Australia, Dubai and Spain.
During the years after independence and partition of India in 1947,
Sindhis have reached a stage when their wealth, education, influence and
opportunities are rising. But the question is: Who is rising? Sindhis as
individuals, or Sindhi community as a whole? The stark reality is that
in the midst of this progress, the community as a cultural entity is disappearing;
Sindhi culture is fading away; our children will know nothing of it . Sindhi
language is vanishing; our youngsters will know little of it. Even knowledge,
that Sind was our homeland, and sustained us for centuries, will lose all
its impact for our younger generation.
A Sindhi, then, attached to no ancient homeland, nourished by no unique
culture, served by no special language, may come to be absorbed - by marriage,
domicile, whim or chance - here, there, everywhere; but as a community,
with the passage of time, Sindhis will have no identity, belong nowhere,
have no bonds with any single culture, and not even, the memory of its
roots, unless corrective steps are taken.
In so far as other communities are concerned, the fact is that all over
the world, people wish to reach out, to touch their roots, to discover
how and where their ancestors resided, what their dreams, hopes and aspirations
were; they are all seeking an identity with their ancient ancestry, and
be a part of its cultural continuity. It would be strange that Sindhis
should contemplate moving into the sunset of nothingness as a community,
forget about the roots of their culture, and be individually assimilated
into new and diverse cultures and communities!
As ‘Return of the Aryans’ points out, " a generation that remains
unaware of its roots is truly orphaned… and the present silence about our
ancient past represents a theft from our future generations…". There are
several reasons for this cultural holocaust among Sindhis, and one could
blame the parents, historians, opinion-makers, politicians, writers and
many others.
As it is, Sindhis have made many mistakes in the past in the political
and social arena, but if we forget our own roots, that would be our greatest
mistake for the future, and a betrayal of our own children and their generations,
robbing them of self-esteem and the respect due to them from other communities.
It is my hope that ‘Return of the Aryans’ will inspire many writers
to research further the various aspects of the glory and greatness of Sindhi
culture to keep our youth informed and aware of their roots. Unfortunately,
Sindhi philanthropists, so far, have remained aloof from an effort to keep
the memory of our cultural roots alive.
Note: This article is written in my personal capacity, and not on behalf
of the Research & Reference Center. Research & Reference Center
is a non-profit, non-Govt. body, and is dedicated in a modest way, to dissemination
of knowledge of India’s culture.
Abstract.
In Malta, there is currently a well-established business community of
Indian descent. Its origins lie in the development that characterised
the history of “the Indian sub-continent” which led to various migrating
waves across the world. Its establishment and further development in
Malta were however strongly influenced
by the environment of the host country. This article analyses how the
combination of these factors contributed to the present situation of the
Maltese business community of Indian descent.
A
number of shops in Valletta, Malta’s capital city, are owned and run by
persons of Indian origin. These people belong to a well-established and
respected business community which has integrated fully into Maltese
society and at the same time remains proud of its roots. This article is
an investigation into the origins and growth of Indian business in
Malta. It locates the Indians of Malta within the wider historical and
geographical framework within which they belong. It focuses specifically
on the local development of Indian business in terms of lines of trade,
links with other localities in the Mediterranean and elsewhere, and
social relations. This approach reflects the fact that a proper
understanding of Indian business in Malta can only be gained by looking
at the wider picture of the global
§ This
article is derived from a broader study on Sindhi commerce and
diaspora. The author is deeply indebted to Dr. James Laidlaw of King’s
College, Cambridge, for his long-term support and scholarly guidance.
This field research was funded by the Wenner-Gren Foundation for
Anthropological Research and the Emslie Horniman Scholarship Fund of the
Royal Anthropological Institute.
* Mark-Anthony Falzon, Ph.D. (Cantab.) is a graduate and life member of Clare Hall in the University of Cambridge.
diaspora
of Indian traders. Information for this article derives from two
sources. The first is the Malta National Archives, which yields 88
records pertaining to 10 Indian firms and dating from 1887 to 1928.1
The second is anthropological fieldwork conducted intermittently
between 1995 and 2000 in Malta, London, and Bombay (Mumbai) which relies
extensively on oral history as narrated by several senior traders.
All Indian traders living and working in Malta belong to the bhaiband jati2 within the Hindu Sindhi ethno-linguistic group. Locally they are known simply by the generic term ‘l-Indjani’
(‘the Indians’) – this is due to the fact that, as opposed to places
such as London or Bombay, there are no significant populations of
Indians from other ethnic groups to compare them with.
Hindu
Sindhis (henceforth ‘Sindhis’) originate in the province of Sind which
from 1843 to 1947 was the northwesternmost province of British India;
Sind became part of the newly-formed nation-state of Pakistan with the
Independence of India and the Partition of the country in 1947. When the
British conquered Sind and annexed it to their Indian possessions
in 1843, the province had for several hundred years been ruled by a
series of Muslim dynasties. Prior to the Muslim conquest, the population
of Sind was predominantly Hindu with a strong Buddhist presence
(Maclean 1989: 12-4); by the time of the British annexation however, it
was mainly Muslim with roughly one fifth of the population being Hindu.
The Hindus of Sind were mostly employed in trade and small business,
although a very small number of them served as administrators to the
Muslim Talpur Mirs and aristocracy and, later, to the British.
In a
nutshell, there were two major waves of population movement out of
Sind. The first, which originated with the British annexation of the
province in 1843, was confined to a group of merchants from the small
town
of Hyderabad (to be distinguished from the city of Hyderabad in central
India) who, leaving their families behind, struck out in search of
business opportunities to places as far apart as Panama and the Straits
Settlements (today’s Singapore). Because the wares they sold and traded
in originally were the handicrafts of Sind (‘Sind works’), these
migrants were known as ‘Sindworkis’ and the type of long-distance
translocal commerce they practised as ‘Sindwork’. This first significant
population movement therefore was centred solely around trade and may
be described as a ‘trade diaspora’ (see Cohen 1971).
The
second migration on the other hand was a direct result of the political
and social strife that came with the Partition of India in 1947. Sindhis
left their homes in the fledgling Pakistan en masse and moved to India
or to locations such as Malta where they already had considerable
business interests. Since then the Sindhis that had settled in India
after Partition have participated in a third migration: the so-called
‘Indian diaspora’ which has seen millions of people move out of the
subcontinent in search of opportunity.
Sindhi
migration therefore is typical of modern mass migrations from India
(and South Asia generally), which have taken place within two broad
contexts: the first, that of Imperialism within which Indians left the
subcontinent as indentured labourers or (as in the case of the Sindhis)
independent traders; the second, that of free migration to western
countries and the Middle East in search of better job opportunities in
all sectors (Jayawardena 1973, Clarke et al.
1990). As a result of this series of migrations, Sindhis today are
dispersed in well over a hundred countries. They retain a degree of
cohesion that manifests itself in marriage and kinship practices, in the
politics of group identity and, most notably, in the types of business
relations they engage in.
It
is mainly the first wave of diaspora that concerns us here. Sindwork and
its long-distance networks of trade emanating from Hyderabad was also
but not only the product of historical contingency: a number of causal
factors were at play. First, the deposal of the Talpur Mirs by the
British caused a sudden breakdown in the patterns of consumption of highquality
handicrafts by local ruling elites with the result that established
Hindu Sindhi traders had to locate new markets for their goods. Second,
the world in the second half of the nineteenth century was one of
rapidly growing opportunities and a British-dominated, expanding world
economy. This happened on two levels: first, the growing ease of communication
and transport in north-west India and Sind itself, and second, the
global reality of a growing exchange of goods and people often across
vast distances.
British
rule expanded the limits of communications and transport in Sind. In
1889 for example, the Indus Valley Railways that linked up with major
lines in India to connect Karachi to Delhi was completed. In 1864, the
Indo-European Telegraph Department laid a submarine cable between
Karachi and Fao (in what was then Turkish Arabia), joining the Turkish
line of telegraph and therefore linking up Sind (Karachi) with Europe
(Baillie 1899; Choksey 1983; Hughes, 1874). The efficiency of the
telegraph as a means of communication was quickly realised in the
subcontinent.
More
importantly the Suez Canal, opened in 1871, proved a major impetus
behind the increasing level of transport and communication. In 1891-2
for instance, Sind participated in some sort of foreign trade with 37
countries as compared to 18 in 1871-2.3
The
argument here is not merely that Sind was linked up with the world in
terms of enterprise and trade, but that this world was itself expanding
rapidly due partly to the British ‘policy of adventure’ and cultivation
of free trade. Besides, the case of Sind is typical in that the second
half of the nineteenth century witnessed the beginning of large scale
communication
technologies with the diffusion of the telegraph and the invention of
the telephone. The electric telegraph in particular had been widely in
existence since 1837 but grew into a communication network, connecting
the world on a large scale, as soon as it could rely on the diffusion of
electricity (Castells 1996: 34-9). The period, that has been described
as the ‘second Industrial Revolution’ (see for instance Singer et al,
1958), was one of confluence of different technological developments
that created new ways of producing, travelling, and communicating. This
3. Annual
Statement of the Trade and Navigation of the Province of Sind, 1870-1,
1890-1 (Royal Commonwealth Society Collection, Cambridge).
point
is essential in order to understand the link between a small landlocked
town in Sind and a Mediterranean island: although the move out of Sind
by Hyderabadi traders was a reaction to local circumstances, it was
feasible only because of the global realities of the latter half of the
nineteenth century. This then was the infrastructure which made possible the bridging of geographical boundaries through trade and brought the first Sindworkis to Maltese shores.
The
first Sindwork firms were established in Hyderabad around 1860. After
this date one comes across Hyderabadi traders setting up business in
several places around the world. They arrived in Japan a few years after
the 1868 Meiji Restoration (Chugani 1995: 23); in 1890 Bulchand, a bhaiband from
Hyderabad, landed on the shores of the Gold Coast in what today is
Ghana (Mahtani, 1997); around 1880, Sindhi traders went to Ceylon
(Chattopadhyaya 1979); in 1870, Sindhi firms established themselves
in Gibraltar, and in Sierra Leone via Mediterranean routes in 1893
(Merani and Van Der Laan 1979: 240); and in Hong Kong, a small Sindhi
community was active by the late nineteenth century (White 1994: 5).
The
first thrust of the diaspora seems to have been in the direction of the
Mediterranean – Markovits (2000: 117) holds that their first destination
was Egypt – and later through India to the Far East. The Mediterranean
then as now was a favourite destination with travellers and tourists
from Britain and the industrial countries of northern Europe, and as
such constituted a profitable market for the handicrafts of Sind – which
were of high repute among connoisseurs of ‘Oriental’ (in Edward Said’s
sense) artefacts. Around the same time the ‘overland route’ to India
through the Mediterranean and the Red Sea (rather than round the Cape of
Good Hope) became popular with the coming of steamers – P. & O.
vessels, for example, began plying this route in 1840. Passengers would
embark at the ports of the north and sail round through Gibraltar,
disembarking at Alexandria and proceeding by Nile steamer to Cairo; from
Cairo they went by carriage to Suez where they embarked on another boat
down the Red Sea and frequently changed into a third one at Aden
according to whether their final destination was Bombay, Calcutta, or
Madras (Tindall 1982: 93, 175). The names of these places come up again
and again in the papers of Sindworki firms from the mid-nineteenth
century. The Mediterranean,
then, with its shiploads of travellers eager to buy into the idea of
‘authentic’ souvenirs, provided an attractive market for the Sindworkis.
Later,
as Sindworkis diversified into curios and silk and started to draw upon
sources other than the local production of Sind, they found excellent
centres of production and sourcing in India and the Far East,
particularly Bombay (where many Sindwork firms set up depots and, in
some cases, offices functioning in conjunction with Hyderabad) and
Japan. The main line of trade of Sindwork was the export of silk and
curios from the East to the West. (Here the points of the compass
pertain to the provenance of producers / consumers rather than their
location – in the geographical sense, an Indian-made curio sold to a
British traveller in Singapore, for instance, was moving from West to
East.) Firms were quick to open new branches and expand their network to
places as far away as Panama and Australia, generally following the
lines of international travel – not surprisingly, their expansion often
converged with the advance of the British Empire, itself the major actor
in the large-scale international human interactions of the time. Maps 1
(and its inset Map 2), compiled from the letterheads of 10 firms that
had a branch in Malta around 1917, show the locations of Sindwork
activities during that period. Note that, even allowing for the
limitations of these maps (by no means all Hyderabadi firms were
represented in Malta), Sindwork appears as a truly global trade
diaspora.
The
earliest record of Sindworki activities in Malta dates from 1887; then,
the firm Pohoomull Brothers applied to the colonial authorities for the
release from customs of one case containing ‘oriental goods and some
fancy weapons as knives, daggers, etc.’ Since the application states the
firm’s intention to sell these wares in its shop, it is evident that it
had been operating in Malta for some time to move established a shop
(CSG No. 4949 / 1887).By the first decade of the twentieth century, at
least 10 Sindwork firms had set up business in Malta. For many of these
firms, Malta was one node in a trade network spanning the Far East, the
Mediterranean, East and West Africa, and South America.
Although
the main trade was that of the export of silk and curio items from the
Far East and India respectively to the tourist and visitor entrepots of
the Mediterranean and South America, there were significant subsidiary
currents of a more localised aspect. Thus, for example,
there
were circum-Mediterranean networks which were engaged in the re-export
of goods that did not sell well in a particular place, or in the export
of locally-manufactured products. In 1916, for instance, one Ramchand
Kilumal applied for permission to export to Salonika (Greece) £25 worth
of silver filigree, £50 worth of artificial silk goods, £50 worth of
Maltese lace, £25 worth of ‘fancy’ embroidery, £10 worth of curios, and
£50 in cash – the intention was to open a shop in Salonika, ostensibly
on the grounds of slack sales in Malta (CSG No. 1466 /1916).
The
typical Sindhi establishment in Malta was an import business and a
retail outlet on the main shopping thoroughfare of the Island, Strada
Reale (later Kingsway and today Republic Street) in the capital
Valletta. As photographs from the period show, the shops were generally
well laid-out and the wares arranged in an attractive way – this was a
luxury tourist market that required central locations and a quality
image. Apart from the main shop and business premises, many firms ran
smaller secondary shops as well as peddling operations; records show
that Sindhi bhaibands from Hyderabad were brought over to Malta to work as pedlars – these operated as ‘bumboatmen’, itinerant waterborne retailers who plied the harbour of Valletta and sold their wares on board ships.
It
is worth keeping in mind that the factor behind the presence of Sindhis
in Malta was the geographical location of the island within the context
of the British Empire. Most Mediterranean shipping routes included Malta
on their itinerary and this meant a large presence of travellers,
troops, and administrators stopping over briefly and exploring Valletta,
including the main shopping area that was situated a couple of streets
away from the harbour. The dependence of Sindhi firms on tourists and
stop-overs was evident in the spatial location of their businesses. It
represented a three-pronged effort aimed at maximising on the time the
visitors spent in Malta: the main shop/s on Strada Reale, a secondary
shop/s on the streets leading from the harbour to Strada Reale (such as
the area around Victoria Gate), and pedlars plying their wares around
the harbour itself. From the time a ship dropped anchor to the time it
left Malta, the visitor was tempted constantly by the Sindworkis’ wares.
Their
dependence on the tourist sector was also evident in the type of goods
they sold. Up to around 1930 Sindhi shops in Malta were mostly engaged
in the curio and luxury textiles trade; a typical Sindwork shopfront
sign from 1907, for instance, read ‘Grand Indo-Egyptian Persian Bazaar –
Suppliers to the German Imperial Family.’ They catered for the
Orientalist tastes of tourists and visitors and made little effort to
explore the local market. This is not to say that they had no Maltese
customers; turn of the century Japanese ceramics, one of the lines that
Sindhis dealt in, survive in many a Maltese home today. Shops were
stocked with Japanese ceramics and antimony wares, brassware, silk items
of clothing such as kimonos imported mainly from Japan, silver
filigree, embroideries, and curiosities.
Interestingly,
another popular item was Maltese lace. The local lace industry had
gained in profile during the latter half of the nineteenth century
through exposition at various International Exhibitions and the
much-publicised personal liking to Maltese lace of Queen Victoria. This
created an international demand and by the turn of the century it is
estimated that up to 7,000 Gozitan (Maltese lace was in fact mainly
produced in Gozo, Malta’s sister island) women were involved in the
cottage industry of lace-making (Azzopardi 1991, 1998). Sindwork firms
were quick to capitalise on this demand and, apart from selling it in
their shops in Malta, used their international networks to export
substantial quantities of lace mainly to North Africa but also to places
as far apart as Batavia (Java) and Johannesburg.4
By the first decade of the century, in fact, most Sindwork firms in
Malta were advertising themselves as commission agents and/or retailers
of Maltese lace. It is also possible that some of them were contracting
the manufacture of lace specifically for export.
The
Sindworki firms seem to have been well-organised: they had letterheads
printed professionally for their correspondence for instance, and they
also enrolled the services of the town’s more established lawyers when
relating to the colonial government. In all cases the head-offices,
where the important decisions regarding the firm network were taken and
personnel enrolled, were in Hyderabad; the telegraph was widely used for
rapid communication between Malta and Sind. Most Sindworkis present in
Malta at the time were salaried employees.
4. CSG
Nos 2941/1917, 1886 /1917 respectively. The firm Dhunamall Chellaram,
then one of the major Sindwork firms, applied for permission to export a
parcel containing Maltese lace to Batavia; the firm Tarachand and Sons
applied for permission to mail Maltese lace to P. Lalchand in
Johannesburg through the medium of the Anglo-Egyptian Bank of Malta.
Table 1
Sindwork Firms Operating in Malta during Given Periods of
Review, and Number of Relative Personnel
| Firm | Period under | Number of |
| Review | Personnel | |
| N. Tarachand & Sons | 1917 to 1922 | 3 |
| K. Gopaldas | 1918 to 1920 | 2 |
| Tahilram & Sons | 1918 to 1921 | 7 |
| N. Ramsami | 1919 to 1922 | 6 |
| Pohoomull Bros | 1899 to 1922 | 17 |
| Hotchand & Co. | 1917 to 1922 | 23 |
| Ramchand & Thanvardas | 1916 to 1920 | 9 |
| Dhunamall Chellaram | 1912 to 1928 | 14 |
| Udhavadas & Co. | 1916 to 1922 | 11 |
| G. Seeroomal | 1918 to 1920 | 4 |
Each
firm had a manager and a number of shop assistants (who apparently
often doubled as cooks and servants to the managers) depending on the
size of the firm. The owners of the firms are recorded as visiting Malta
from time to time, presumably to check on the progress of the branch
and scout for new ideas/markets.
Table
1 shows the number of personnel associated with each firm during
particular review periods (generally these records derive from requests
for permission for the movement of personnel during wartime and/or
periods of restrictions). Some of the firms were clearly sizeable,
generally those with a wide international network and well-established
business
–
Pohoomull Bros, Dhunamall Chellaram, and Udhavadas & Co, for
instance, were all major Sindwork companies with branches in several
countries.
Employees
were recruited on a two-and-a-half or three year contract basis.
Potential recruits were generally located by word of mouth, inevitable
in a small town like Hyderabad; one case mentions specifically that an
employee was enrolled through an uncle of his who was on good terms with
the owner of the firm, (CSG No. 1822/1906).
The passage to and from Hyderabad was paid for by the firm; in the few
cases in which salary is mentioned, it appears that half the employees’
monthly salary was sent back home to Hyderabad, and the other half given
to the employees
in lump sum when their contracts ended (this was probably only the case
with junior employees). During their period of employment they lived
together in housing provided by the firm, usually in Valletta itself or
its suburb, Floriana. Neither managers nor junior employees were allowed
to bring their wives and dependents over from Hyderabad and it was only
after Partition in 1947 that Sindhi men in Malta were joined by their
families. There are several instances of relatives working together in
the same firm: one Metharam Kirpalani, for instance, was working with
his brother-in-law Thanvardas Nanumal, the proprietor of the firm N.
Ramsami; Khushir Tahilram, the son of Tahilram Thanvardas of Tahilram
& Sons, worked in Malta for at least a year in 1915; in 1919
Parmanand Udhavadas petitioned for his nephew to be allowed to travel to
Malta in order to manage affairs; Ramchand Kilumal, of Ramchand &
Thanvardas, was in joint business with his brother Gopaldas Kilumal (CSG
Nos 726/1919, 2486/1916, 1499/1919, 698/1920).
Relations
between employees and their managers were not without their tensions.
There are instances of employees complaining to the authorities
for being treated badly or sacked summarily by their managers. Two
examples are particularly interesting. In the first case the pleader is
the employee’s brother and is writing from Hyderabad to the colonial authorities
in Malta; he holds that ‘it is a well known fact here (in Hyderabad),
even the local papers here decry these Sind Work merchants as
notoriously cruel and a regular source of harassment for their servants
(employees), whose services they secure with great inducements and
promises, which they honour more in breach than in fulfilment,’ (CSG No.
1822/1906, my parentheses). In the second case, a number of employees
working for four different firms combined to write a letter complaining
about their conditions of work. They held that the average duration of
their working day was of more than fifteen hours (7a.m. to 10/ 11p.m.),
and that they were not allowed days of rest such as Sundays and
religious holidays; they also said that they had to shoulder ‘heavy
responsibilities.’ They asked the authorities to intervene on their
behalf so that they could be given ‘half a day off on Sundays and the
other important days of our religion’, and added that some other
Sindworki firms already provided these benefits. The workers complained
that their managers kept them in line by threatening to report any
insubordination to the firms’ headquarters in Hyderabad (CSG No. 1149 /
1918).
The Corporacy of the Pre-Partition Sindwork Diaspora
Post-1930s Diversification
Table 2
Post-1930s Diversification
Table 2
One
of the author’s first encounters with a Sindhi in Malta was with a
former trader in his 90s who had himself established a Sindwork business
spanning over fifteen countries and who had spent most of his life
travelling. During the conversation we were surrounded by a lively
troupe of great-grandchildren and other relatives, who were being kept
in order by his sprightly wife. Something had kept the man’s life
together as a member of a group and a family. In order to exchange
information and goods, people need to communicate; in order to employ
people and to trade, they need long-term relations of trust; and in
order to reproduce their way of life they require institutions such as
the family. How did human interaction and the establishment of stable
social relations of various sorts function in a society where men were
constantly on the move in search of trading opportunities? In order to
find answers to these questions we must once again broaden our analysis
and think of the Sindwork diaspora as a global whole.
First,
it is important to understand that Sindwork in pre-Partition times was a
trade diaspora with a centre. Although the men involved in Sindwork
spent most of their lives visiting their various branches, it was in
Hyderabad that their homing instincts converged. It is simply not
correct to say, as some Sindhis do today, that Hyderabad was ‘a sort of
retirement home’ – it was that and much more. The head-offices of the
Sindwork kothis (firms) were mostly located in the Shahi Bazaar area of the town, where the heads of the firms sat in their pedhis5
and directed their affairs. The pre-Partition Sindwork diaspora,
therefore, was a trade network whose social relations came together in
Hyderabad.
Hyderabad
was the centre of life in another way. Before 1947 very few women used
to join their husbands overseas. The few men who were accompanied on
their travels by their wives were generally managers or senior employees
who had been trading in a particular place for a long period of time.
Since the Sindworkis’ business was so spatially-shifty it made more
sense for men to commute between Hyderabad and their
5. A pedhi
is the Indian counterpart of the business office, usually consisting of
a room with a floor-mat where the businessman squats surrounded by
correspondence, samples, and account books, and conducts his affairs
with employees, customers or other businessmen. It is a common sight in business districts in India.
various
destinations than for them to become serial home-movers. In terms of
the long-term stability of family and society therefore, leaving the
women behind was probably the most feasible option. It has to be
remembered that the women who were left behind were still part of a
functional family – in the sense of the patrilocal extended family, with
the families of married brothers living together under one roof and
eating from the same kitchen.
Hyderabad
was also the place where the personnel of the diaspora were recruited.
There were two means by which employees were located. The first was
through kinship links: a Sindwork boss looking to expand his network
would first hive his sons off to the various branches, then take on
young blood relatives or men related to him by marriage. The second
means was through circles of patronage within the bhaiband community
in Hyderabad. It is clear that the more successful firm owners were
under a constant pressure to take on young men known to them or their
managers or families through personal contact in Hyderabad itself. It
was common for an older member of the community, or someone with social
connections, to plead for employment on behalf of a son or a younger
member of the family – this was done by both men and women.
As regards employment itself, there were two systems in operation. The first was based on the old gumashta
(agent) system whereby the owner of the firm employed agents to run his
various branches. These agents were a type of working partners – they
worked on a commission basis, and had some degree of autonomy. The
second and by far the commonest type was that of the salaried employee.
Employees were recruited generally on a three-year written contract that
bound both employer and employee for the duration of that period. Bhaiband boys
were enrolled at a young age (fifteen or so was a typical age for a
son, slightly older for a relative/ acquaintance, to leave school and
join a business) and assigned to a particular branch.
Life
as a junior employee of a Sindwork firm was not easy. The men were
usually housed in dormitory-style accommodation although senior employees
often had separate quarters. Working hours were long (typically 12 to
15 hours a day) and employees usually had only half a day off on Sunday –
although, as the litigations from Malta show, this was by no means a
fixture. Informants who remember life in the firms told me that rather
than a job in the conventional sense, Sindwork was an all-embracing way
of life. Employees were expected to be at the service of their managers
round the clock – one informant even remembers having to massage his
manager’s feet after a day’s work, and another told me how his manager
would rob him of his few free hours on Sunday to help him sort out the
correspondence.
It
is evident that as Sindwork developed the gap between employers and
employees, the ‘bosses’ and those who were ‘in service’, widened. The
former had business experience, trading capital, established networks of
patronage, and all the trappings of prestige and affluence; the latter
lived more modest lives that rested upon the hope of accumulating enough
capital and experience to be able to set up their own business.
Although bhaiband literally means ‘brotherhood’, it is clear that the brothers were on unequal terms.
Originally,
wherever the Sindworkis went, they tended to keep to themselves and
form little enclaves. They did not necessarily mix with other groups of
Indians present in their destinations as traders or indentured workers.
By the mid-twentieth century, trading associations were being formed by
Sindhis around the world, usually aimed at protecting their interests as
a group. Yet even within these enclaves, competition was rife.
Individual firms expected complete loyalty from their employees and did
not encourage them to socialise widely, especially not with the
employees of other firms.
Again,
as the joint petition for better conditions from Malta shows, the
employees did not necessarily subscribe to this idea. Members of particular
firms ate and worked together, slept under the same roof, and sometimes
did puja (worship) together – this was partly because the risk of trade
information leaking to another Sindwork firm was a constant worry to
the employers and considered to be too great to encourage a wider
socialisation.
To
return to a more localised perspective, around the early 1930s a change
took place in the Sindwork business based in Malta: the main companies
withdrew their interests. According to the memory of Sindhis living in
Malta today, this was due to falling profits. This explanation is
probably correct given that the worldwide economic recession and the
resulting flop in tourism dealt a heavy blow to the silk and curio
industry
–
the firm Udhavadas & Co, for instance, was one of the casualties
(Markovits 2000: 143). However, the shops that had belonged to these
firms did not close down; rather, they were sold to the former employees
(generally to the managers) of the firms, who were ready to operate at
smaller profits.
From
the late 1930s onwards therefore, Sindhi business in Malta was in the
hands of the erstwhile managers of the Sindwork firms who had become
owners of the retail outlets, and their descendants. Apart from the
close relatives of the traders who moved from Hyderabad to Malta (often
via a number of intermediate stops in India or elsewhere) to join their
menfolk permanently, Partition produced no significant influx of Sindhis
along the established model of ‘splintering off’ the major firms and
recruiting new people from India. There were two reasons behind this.
First, Malta being a very small island with limited market possibilities,
it was not seen as a land of opportunity as were places such as Hong
Kong and Africa. Second, and more importantly, from 1952 to 1985 tight
immigration laws meant that the only Sindhi men who could move to Malta
from elsewhere were those who got married to local Sindhi girls. As one
informant complained, ‘we wanted to do favours to our cousins, but we
couldn’t. In 1952, the doors were closed and we couldn’t bring anyone to
Malta. For 33 years not a single person came from India.’ Sindhi
business in Malta has therefore tended to be passed down and / or to
change hands within / between the same 8-10 families. The local
development of Sindhi business is therefore a very interesting case
study in that it shows a closed system in terms of number of personnel –
even if these people remained well-connected in terms of both family
(through marriage, that is) and business to Sindhis across the world.
This
shift in the personnel structure coincided with a general change of
line. Although a few shops continued to deal in the old line of curios
and luxury textiles, many of them started to diversify and explore the
local market, concentrating on a wider variety of textiles. By the
beginning of World War Two the strength of Sindhi businesses in Malta
had become the import, wholesale, and retail of textiles mainly for the
local market.
Many
of the shops specialising in curios and luxury textiles had shifted
towards and diversified into the general textile sector. This proved to
be a wise choice. The post-War period in Malta was characterised by the
growing affluence and changing expectations of Maltese society – indeed,
old people in Malta today tend to differentiate strongly between the
lifestyle which they led before and that which they led after the War.
The textiles sector gained steadily in importance as Maltese women
generally (as opposed to a small urban elite, that is) became aware of
fashions and started making clothes that went beyond utilitarian
principles and experimented with styles and type of textiles. In the
period between the late 1950s and the mid-1970s Sindhi retailers enjoyed
a veritable bonanza of business. Through their family and trading
connections in the Far East and notably Japan, they had access to
affordable and good quality sources of textiles. During that period they
had little competition from Maltese businessmen and monopolised the
textiles market almost completely – the saying among Maltese
seamstresses was that “if you are looking for quality textiles, ask for
them at the Indians’ shops”.
Things
were to change yet again, however. During the last quarter of the
century Malta’s female workforce increased and diversified even as sex
discrimination was erased officially from wages in 1971. This meant more
women with less time and more cash to spare who needed smart clothes
for everyday use, and who were therefore prone to buying readymades.
Sindhi businesses were quick to respond: by the mid-1980s, almost all
of the textile shops in Valletta had changed their line to readymades,
with an emphasis on the lower-middle end of the market. This time
competition with Maltese-owned businesses was intense but the Sindhis
were able to combine competitive prices with relatively good quality and
managed to hold their ground in this new sector very well indeed. The
proliferation of Maltese-owned boutiques in fact offered new
opportunities for Sindhis, since almost all of them became large-scale
wholesalers as well as retailers; previously they had tended to concentrate
on import and retail. Most boutiques owned and run by Maltese were and
still are small local ventures that rely on wholesalers with established
import links for their stocks. Sindhis relied on their knowledge
and established networks of translocal trade (one should keep in mind
that they could draw upon a long history of Sindwork) to supply these
small retailers. Today around 19 Sindhi-owned businesses deal in
ready-mades while four deal in textiles (see Table 2). The latter
specialise in high quality textiles – there is still a demand for this
upper end of the
Number of Shops in Different Lines of Trade Operated
and Owned by Sindhis in Malta, 1999
and Owned by Sindhis in Malta, 1999
| Line | Number of Shops/Concerns |
| Women’s Clothing | 14 |
| General Clothing | 5 |
| Souvenirs | 5 |
| Bazaar-type / Gifts / Nick-Nacks | 5 |
| Textiles | 4 |
| Children’s Clothing | 2 |
| Fashion Accessories | 2 |
| Restaurant | 4 |
| Commission Agent | 2 |
| Toys | 1 |
| Supplier to Industry | 1 |
| Real Estate | 1 |
market since Maltese women prefer to have clothes made to measure for special occasions such as weddings.
Not
all Sindhi businesses made the shift from curios to textiles to
readymades, however. Two or three continued to operate in the
bazaar-type line and to cater for tourists as well as for an increasing
number of Maltese people looking for off-beat gifts or cheap home
decorations. These bazaar-type shops were very explorative and
innovative in their choice of lines. In the early 1980s for instance,
cheap electronics such as watches, calculators, and games sold very well
indeed; again, the Sindhis’ connections in Hong Kong and other
mass-production centres of the Far East placed them in an excellent
position to import, retail, and wholesale to Maltese shopkeepers. Their
shops, situated as they were on Malta’s prime shopping street, were
almost assured brisk business provided the product was attractive.
The
central location of their shops also meant that the Sindhis were
excellently placed to tap one major economic boom when it came.
Throughout the 1970s and 1980s tourism grew dramatically from an
insignificant trickle and by 1989 the annual figure of one million
visitors had been reached. A number of Sindhi businessmen (generally
those in the bazaar-type line) ventured into souvenirs and at present a
significant number
of souvenir shops in Valletta belong to Sindhis – at one point, one
enterprising individual ran a chain of four shops, all situated on the
main street and all of which had belonged at one time to the Sindwork
firms.
Since
the 1970s Sindhis in Malta have ventured increasingly into new lines.
One business set up in 1972 specialises in supply to industry – his
company employs 19 Maltese people and imports and distributes a range of
products used by the local manufacturing industry. A few have opened
Indian restaurants as a subsidiary business to their import and wholesale
trade; these are staffed by chefs and waiters brought over specially
from India (not Sindhis, though) and two are co-owned with Maltese
partners. One young entrepreneur whose father is in the import, wholesale,
and retail of souvenirs and bazaar-type goods has set up a separate
real estate agency, again in partnership with a Maltese businessman.
Worthy
of mention is the fact that Sindhi traders in Malta came together in
1955 to form the Indian Merchants’ Association (Malta). This indicates a
change in the spatial perception of business. Before Partition, when
Sindworki firms were for the most part based in Hyderabad, local
operations in Malta and elsewhere were seen as ‘branches’, as extensions
of the company that is. The morphological metaphor of the branch linked
geographical extensions across space to the main trunk based in
Hyderabad: the tree was the firm. After Partition, when it became clear
that an eventual return to Sind was unlikely, local operations were
visualised as pockets of business, located quanta of firms; there was no
longer a ‘branch’ connecting them to Hyderabad. The Association was
never very active in actual terms and in 1989 it was renamed the
Maltese-Indian Community, this fact supporting my argument for a shift
in perception towards a located ethnic group. Today it concerns itself
with community activities such as Diwali parties and running the temple
and community centre.
The
general trend is that while in the early days of its establishment
Sindhi business in Malta was a specialised operation, it has moved in
the direction of diversification, higher local investment, and
embeddedness in the Maltese business world. The various lines Sindhis
have explored are in part a result of local market conditions, but they
are also products of connections with Sindhi businessmen living around
the world which have enabled them to integrate in local economic
structures.
Conclusion
In Malta, the development of Indian (Sindhi) business has to be understood in terms of a small and somewhat-restricted (because of immigration
laws) community operating within the context of a small nation-state
with limited and shifting local markets. On the other hand, this
community is part of a much broader global diaspora spanning well over
100 countries. Historically as well as in the contemporary reality, this
translocal connectivity has given Sindhis an edge in business and
ensured their long-term survival. L-Indjani have been part of Malta’s commercial landscape for the last 115-odd years and they look set to endure as such.
References
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Sindhi Culture
The Sindhis, I believe, have a rich contribution to make to the thought and life of India and Humanity. We are children of one of the most ancient civilisations of the world - the Indus Valley Civilisation.
Ancient is the civilisation to which the Sindhis belong. When the Aryans came to India and stood on the banks of the mighty river Indus, they exclaimed in sheer wonder, "Sindhu! Sindhu!" The word 'Sindhu' appears in a number of hymns in the oldest Scripture of humanity, the Rigveda. The Sindhu (Indus) valley civilisation is at least 7,000 years old. And India was originally called, "Sindhustan" the " Land of the Sindhu". My regret is that many Sindhis - scattered, as they are, all over India and the world - are unaware of rich heritage which belongs to them.
Ancient History
The South Asian region is separated from the rest of Asia by a wall of ranges - the Hindu Kush, the Sulaiman, the Karakoram and the Himalayas. Below these are the seemingly endless plains drained by the Indus, the Ganges and the Brahmaputra rivers.
In the geological youth of the world, the entire subcontinent was part of the ocean bed. Its ring of mountains was a wall of cliff-shored islands holding back the waves from the Asian heartland as they now hold back the monsoon clouds. The ocean receded; the bed became fertile plain. Rivers began to find their way to the now distant ocean. The longest of three great sub continental rivers is the Indus, now in Pakistan, then Sind. The river has given its name to a country and a religion- ironically, not the country through which it flows or the religion of the people who live by its waters. It is fed by many streams from the mountains of Tibet, the Soviet Union, and Afghanistan. Five other major rivers flows into the Indus: the Jhelum, Chenab, Ravi, Sutlej, and Beas.
This essay is about the people who live along these waters and the people who live in the desserts deprived of these waters. They speak many languages- Urdu, Punjabi, Sindhi, Pashto, Baluchi, Brahui, Gujrati, to name some - reflecting the diversity of their historical and cultural experience. The people of the Indus live in four provinces of Pakistan. They are the products of unnumbered historical permutations and combinations, the fusion and clashes of fifty-five centuries of civilisation.
In the 1920s an expedition of the Indian Archaeological Survey under Sir John Marshall excavated an interesting mound of earth in the Sind region of then British India. The locals called this particular earthy protuberance Mohan-jo-daro - "the place of the dead." Sir John and his -party discovered one of the world's most ancient cities beneath it. Up to that time the ancient settled areas along the Tigris-Euphrates and the Nile River systems had seemed to merit the title of "cradle of civilisation" - now the Indus was making its claim and new theories had to be devised.
Other sites were investigated, and the cities of the Indus Valley were unearthed - Harappa, Chanhu-daro, Lothal, Kot Diji-highly developed cities that told of a civilisation which had began around 3000 BC, reached apex by 2000, and completely perished by 1000 B.C.
The remains excavated in Mohan-jo-Daro depict the state of affairs from civilisation point of view at that period. These Aryans in Sindh virtually the Indus Valley are mentioned in history of having played role in the battle of Hastinapur when King Jaidrath took his army to support the Kurus. The Sindhis rule the Sindh till they were defeated and conquered by the Arabs in the seventh century. And from that time onwards they played the role of refugees.
Recent Past
With the Partition in 1947 they have had to leave their home and have spread themselves out in every part of the world. And they still continue to be refugees. Though they are refugees driven away from their home they are again with their own Aryans who had spread out in parts of the country. The brother Aryans kept the banner of Sindh alive by including their identity in the National Song and recognizing as a positive community whose future lies in recovering the land of their birth and supporting the country as they did in the battle of Hastinapur. For at that time we learnt that we were part of the central government ruled by Duryodhana.
When, due to the partition of India, the Sindhis were dispossessed of their lands and properties, they did not give into despair. Leaving their properties and possessions in Sindh, they migrated to India, bringing with themselves their enterprising sprit, their faith in God and their many qualities of head and heart. In Sindh, there was never a Sindhu beggar. When they come to India, they resolved that they would starve rather than beg. Little boys attended school during the day and in the afternoon, kept themselves busy hawking on the streets or in railway trains.
Of the great German mathematician, Dr. Jaccobi, it is said that one day he was asked why he had sacrificed so much and devoted all his time and energies to the development of the arithmetic theory, he replied: - "For the honour of the human spirit!"
Of Maharaj Prakash Bhardwaj it may rightly be said that he has strained every nerve, labored long and untiringly - all for the honor of Sindhi community. He has already given us two monumental volumes in the "Sindhi through the Ages" series. And now he presents us with this magnificent publication, 'Sindhis' International Yearbook (1841-1990).
