Star Of Mysore has an editorial today on court judgments being written in Kannada. The editorial questions  P. D. Dinakaran’s (the new Chief Justice of Karnataka High Court) call to lower court judges to write judgments in Kannada. Let me quote two paragraphs in particular.

It has been made out that if judgements are written in Kannada, the petitioners will clearly understand the ruling. That is a bit hard to concede because Kannada in use in the State has distinct variations. Influence of Malayalam and Tulu in Dakshina Kannada district, that of Marathi in Uttara Kannada district, Urdu in Hyderabad-Karnataka region, and lastly, Telugu and Tamil in districts bordering Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu can yield court rulings not 100 per cent intelligible to petitioners.

Higher courts in which judgements of lower courts are questioned will have to wrestle with the aforementioned variants of Kannada even if translated into English for the benefit of Higher Court Judges who do not know Kannada.

Now this line of argument is nonsense. Variations in Kannada aren’t so radical as to prevent a Kannadiga from Bellari understand the judgment given in Kodagu. Kannada has been used for writing for over 1600 years and it has functioned quite well if only because written language is always by and large shared by all Kannada speakers. And then to suggest that English is without variants and perfectly transparent to everybody is idiotic.

Finally, why is this question of translation such a big issue? At any given point of time, there are less than thirty non-Kannada speaking High Court judges. Give each one a personal translator and the problem is solved.

The most-written, over-hyped, over-NBCed (rest of the world is lucky that it is not subjected to NBC’s ghastly coverage of Olympics) Olympic hero Michael Phelps (and his coach, Bob Bowman) nevertheless must have this feeling of true satisfaction. Everything they had planned, hoped and aspired for worked out. Beyond all the money and fame, ultimately, that’s the goal and for a coach and athlete, there is no greater feeling than a job done well.

Usain ‘the lightning’ Bolt was just fantastic.

Jacques Rogge, the IOC President, is an idiot.

If, as SOM reported yesterday, Mysore Deputy Commissioner Manivannan comes through on his promise of separate bicycle lanes in city roads, that would be splendid.

It is important to encourage bicycle riding in a city like Mysore, which is still manageable and where people can get around on bicycles. I do not know whether Manivannan’s move will result in anything concrete but I commend any bureaucrat who took a moment to notice the traffic on our roads and especially, the plight of bicycle riders.

Manivannan himself promises to ride a bicycle as from November 1st as long as he is posted in Mysore and use his official car only when necessary. Good for him.

ESPN.com’s Paul Kuharsky reports that Indianapolis Colts run a play called Ghandi.

Tight End Dallas Clark explains:

“Usually, I know the origin or the background of what the code word means for the play. But for Ghandi, I’ve forgotten how that one came about. Six years in this offense, we have everything. Some you question or some are really good because they make sense, maybe they give the direction of left or right.”

So what does Ghandi mean?

“I can’t tell you that,” he said. “All we have to hear is Ghandi and we know what we are doing, so I don’t know the extent we can talk about the words. Because that’s how we get to that play, is by that word. So if someone knows what that word means, then they can pick up on some stuff.”

Clark catches football for a living and doesn’t do Indian history. So not knowing what Ghandi means isn’t such a big deal.

May be I should stop bugging my students for not knowing enough about Gandhi or for spelling his name wrong.

Now that the moment of celebration is over, the snark returns. Read this nonsense from a SOM editorial on child marriages. Let me quote the relevant lines since SOM doesn’t do archive.

District In-charge Minister Shobha Karandlaje promised on Friday that a probe would be initiated into child marriage in the State. The matter has larger ramification.

The origin of child marriages in India is traced to the era of Muslim, Moghul invasions over the land. The invaders raped unmarried local girls and even carried them as booty according to history or mere claims. Some say it existed even before Muslim invasion all over India. The parents are said to have adopted the practice of child marriage to protect them. But, such threats do not exist any more. Some issues arise. (highlighting mine)

I am a professional historian and let me say as clearly as I can. While SOM’s speculative history appeals to our common sense, it is flat out baseless, and wrong. We simply do not know. The writing here is so sloppy and imprecise, perhaps deliberately so, since the language of insinuations and innuendo has to have that character. The language of editorials cannot sink so low.

An Indian finally wins an individual Olympic gold. This precocious young man called Abhinav Bindra has had a very nice career so far but this is a stupendous achievement, on a day when everything came together for him.

A moment to celebrate, if only because we can move beyond our usual snark and the disappointing performances by the Indian contingent thus far.

Star of Mysore had two reports yesterday on Mysore District in-charge Minister, Shobha Karandlaje.

At a district-level review meeting of officials and people’s representatives at Zilla Panchayat, Ms. Karandlaje said that the fertilizer crisis is not serious.

Then, in a second meeting on Dasara preparations, Ms. Karandlaje outlined her vision of Dasara. Let me quote from the SOM report:

Mysore Dasara is very much a personification of kings and Goddess Chamundeshwari and in this context, the kings of other countries would be invited and felicitated during Dasara.

This is the vision put forth by District in-charge Minister Shobha Karandlaje for this year’s colourful Dasara. Talks have been held with the Union Government for the realisation of this vision, during which a list of the kings and kings of other countries were sought, thus paving the way for a new trend, she said.

Dasara as the personification of Gods and Kings? Does the honorable Minister not realize we live in a modern, democratic era? Why felicitate kings? Is there any reason to recognize and honor royalty today? It is unconscionable for a democratic representative such as Ms. Karandlaje to make such a suggestion.

What bothers me is simply this. On the one hand, Ms. Karandlaje et al seem to be incapable of recognizing the reality that stares them in the face. Hence the reality denying statement on fertilizer crisis. On the other hand, they are keen to take us back to a medieval period. Do they not even realize how reactionary and backward looking they sound when they speak of honoring kings?

What’s wrong with these people?

ಪುತ್ತೂರಿನಲ್ಲಿ ಚಿಕುನ್ ಗುನ್ಯ ಹಾವಳಿ ವಿಪರೀತ ಮತ್ತು ಮೂವತ್ತಕ್ಕಿಂತ ಹೆಚ್ಚು ಜನರು ಈ ರೋಗಕ್ಕೆ ಬಲಿಯೂ ಆಗಿದ್ದಾರೆ. ನಮ್ಮ ಘನ ಸರ್ಕಾರ ಇದುವರಗೆ ರೋಗದ ಹತೋಟಿಗೆ ತೆಗೆದುಕೊಂಡ ಕ್ರಮಗಳಾವುವೂ ಯಶಸ್ವಿಯಾಗಿಲ್ಲ.

ಜನರೇನು ಮಾಡಬೇಕು? ನಿನ್ನೆ ಪುತ್ತೂರಿನ ಜನ ಧನ್ವಂತರಿ ಯಾಗ ಮಾಡಿದ್ದಾರೆ. ಟಿವಿ ೯ ಸಂದರ್ಶನದಲ್ಲಿ ಮಾತನಾಡಿದ ವ್ಯವಸ್ಥಾಪಕರೆಲ್ಲ ದೈವದ ಮೊರೆ ಹೋಗುವುದೊಂದೇ ತಮಗುಳಿದಿರುವ ದಾರಿ ಎಂದರಲ್ಲದೇ, ಯಾಗವನ್ನು ವೇದಗಳ ನಿಯಮಗಳಿಗನುಸಾರವಾಗಿಯೇ ಮಾಡುತ್ತಿರುವುದಾಗಿ ಸ್ಪಷ್ಟ ಪಡಿಸಿದರು.

ಭಾಜಪದ ಹಿಂದು ರಾಜ್ಯದಲ್ಲಿ ಮಂತ್ರಿಗಳೇ ದೈವದ ಮೊರೆ ಹೊಕ್ಕಿರುವಾಗ ಸಾಮಾನ್ಯ ಜನರದ್ದೇನು ವಿಶೇಷ ಎನ್ನಬಹುದು ಬಿಡಿ.

ಕಳೆದ ಅರು ವಾರಗಳಲ್ಲಿ ಕುವೆಂಪುರ ಪದ್ಯ “ಧ್ರಾಂ ಧ್ರೀಂ ಧ್ರೂಂ” ನೆನಪಾಗಿರುವಷ್ಟು ಮತ್ತೆಂದೂ ಅಗಿಲ್ಲ.

On sunday, Vijaya Karnataka had this funny story.

Last weekend farmers from Mandakalli and neighboring villages, who had lost their lands for the Mysore Airport project, met with the district officials. At this meeting, one farmer had this simple demand.

Sir, because of land acquisition for the airport, the road to my farm is gone. Would you kindly give me a plane, please?

I must say it is excruciatingly painful to watch English language being butchered by Amir Sohail et al. It’s not as if these former cricketers have any good insights on the game. On the contrary, they recite cliches, cannot speak on what’s happening in front of their eyes and sometimes even misread what’s on the screen. Even the better ones in this group - Arun Lal and Ramiz Raja - have regressed badly.