How do languages die?
31-year-old Tulsi Rajbar is probably one of the first Rajis to have written songs and poems in her native tongue Raji, spoken by a small community of tribals found in the remote hills of Uttarakhand. Her ancestors moved downward from hills in waves and finally settled in the foothills of Champawat.
With the help of local NGOs and linguists like Kavita Rastogi, Rajbar learnt to read and write in Raji and in 2022, started teaching Raji to local children under the Wikitongues Language Revitalization Fellowship's 2022 program. As funds for the project ran out in a year, Rajbhar was forced to return to labour work.
With nearly 600 languages in India facing extinction, India is facing imminent loss of indigenous culture and heritage that is expressed and preserved through this cornucopia of tongues and dialects. When looked at closely, the trajectory of languages reflects the socio-economic and political trajectory of the community itself.
Reporter: Rakhi Bose
Camera: Tribhuvan Tiwari
Editor: Divya Tiwari
#RajiLanguage #IndigenousLanguages #LanguageExtinction #UttarakhandTribals #CulturalHeritage #TulsiRajbar #Wikitongues #LanguageRevitalization #ClimateImpact #FloodsInUttarakhand #IndigenousVoices
With the help of local NGOs and linguists like Kavita Rastogi, Rajbar learnt to read and write in Raji and in 2022, started teaching Raji to local children under the Wikitongues Language Revitalization Fellowship's 2022 program. As funds for the project ran out in a year, Rajbhar was forced to return to labour work.
With nearly 600 languages in India facing extinction, India is facing imminent loss of indigenous culture and heritage that is expressed and preserved through this cornucopia of tongues and dialects. When looked at closely, the trajectory of languages reflects the socio-economic and political trajectory of the community itself.
Reporter: Rakhi Bose
Camera: Tribhuvan Tiwari
Editor: Divya Tiwari
#RajiLanguage #IndigenousLanguages #LanguageExtinction #UttarakhandTribals #CulturalHeritage #TulsiRajbar #Wikitongues #LanguageRevitalization #ClimateImpact #FloodsInUttarakhand #IndigenousVoices
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NewsTranscript
00:00How do languages die? Sometimes it's due to the death of the speakers of that language.
00:13But sometimes it's also due to the death of opportunities of livelihood and survival
00:18that the language provides to its speakers. That is the case of the Raji tribe, a remote
00:24tribe which lives in Uttarakhand. Once known as the kings of the forest, the remote and
00:29ethnically unique Raji tribe has become one of the most endangered tribes in India.
00:36Tulsi Rajbar, a 31-year-old Raji, is probably one of the first Rajis to have written songs
01:04and poems in her native tongue, Raji, spoken by a small community of tribals found in the
01:09remote hills of Uttarakhand. Her ancestors had moved downward from hills in waves and
01:15finally settled in the foothills of Champawat, hoping for a better life.
01:20With the help of local NGOs and linguists like Kavita Rastogi, Rajbar learned to read
01:37and write in Raji and in 2022 started teaching Raji to local children under the Wiki Tongues
01:43Language Revitalization Fellowship Programme 2022. As funds of the project ran out in a
01:49year, Rajbar was forced to return to labour work. This year, her house was flooded after
02:06excessive rains and all her books and diary have been swept away in the floods, along
02:12with her dreams of becoming a singer. With nearly 600 Indian languages facing extinction,
02:21India is facing imminent loss of indigenous culture and heritage that is expressed and
02:25preserved through this cornucopia of tongues and dialects. When looked at closely, the
02:31trajectory of languages reflects the socio-economic and political trajectory of the community
02:36itself. Activist Renu Thakur has devoted most of her
02:40life to the preservation of PVTG communities like the Rajis, whose vulnerability gets compounded
02:46by several socio-economic and political factors.
03:31My eldest son heard something in the jungle and shot an arrow. He was killed by a cow.
03:43He was told that he did not return. He felt bad that he was killed by a cow and did not
03:50return. My younger brother came back, but he was found in the jungle because he could not
03:58eat. It is said that his family were the sons of a great king and they remained in the jungle.
04:08First of all, there is livelihood. Everyone talks about education, but we say that it
04:13is a complete circle. Everyone is interlinked with each other. But when there is no food
04:18to eat, when I do not have anything to eat, when there are no options for my livelihood,
04:24I live in the jungle. You banned the jungle due to stringent laws. You banned the wood
04:30cutting, you banned hunting, and you did not give alternatives. So one is that livelihood
04:34is very crucial. Second is definitely education. For this, there should have been school buildings
04:40in their villages. There should have been primary schools and good teachers. Even today,
04:46Even today, high school and inter-school girls and boys study till 8th standard.
04:53Where will they go after that?
04:55They have to cross the entire jungle to reach the main city to do their 10th and 12th.
05:01So this is the responsibility of the government, education.
05:04And the third, which is very important, is health.
05:07As I told you, their own medical system is ending.
05:11Their dependency is on English medicine.
05:14And they are very anemic.
05:17So these are the issues that we feel the government should have taken care of.
05:21And it should be taken care of. It is their responsibility.
05:24Despite government efforts to alleviate the status of such tribes in theory,
05:28reality on ground remains complex.
05:31In Bhasa, we have medicines and herbs.
05:35If we don't tell our children about those medicines and Bhasa,
05:41what will they say? They will say, I don't know anything about the jungle.
05:45The work of wood has come to an end.
05:48The forest department troubles us here.
05:51They don't let us cut the trees.
05:53So the work of wood has come to an end.
05:55Now we are in the mountains.
05:57There used to be wood there.
06:01Now there is no wood there.
06:05Podaraji's development has come at the cost of their language and their past.
06:09Reducing these erstwhile kings of the forest to mere bystanders on the margins of development.
06:15While some like Tulsi and other empowered locals have been working to preserve their mother tongue,
06:20many Rajis today refuse to speak their language in public because of stigma.
06:25Lack of work also means that many are not interested in teaching their children their mother tongue anymore.
06:34With just 1100 Rajis left in India today,
06:37their language faces imminent death and along with it, their unique history, distinct culture and ways of life.