Interrelating Languages through Translation: A Study of

Amrita Pritam’s The Revenue Stamp in Hindi and Marathi Versions

-Dr. Bhagyashree S.Varma.

Translation is an audacious venture of crossing the borders of

bilingualism to reach out to interlingual communication. It is a task that
involves structural and semantic possibilities of the two interrelated languages.
The translator assumes these possibilities of equivalence of notional and
functional dimensions of language. Translation is not simply a search for
semantic identification between bilingual expressions, but a sort of
compromised alteration of form in the hope of retaining sense.

To translate (Trans + latus) is to carry across three entities of language –

the form, the content and the contextual meaning. Translating is actually
transferring linguistic, semantic, stylistic, socio-cultural consciousness through
ideas, images and associations. It is indeed very difficult to determine whether
translation is an approach, a strategy or a compromise while it ranges from an
experimental speech-act to the investigated research.

Translation, apart from its theoretical implications, is an attempt of

interrelating two languages. In such an attempt there are certain uncertainties of
expressions that alter their counter-form in the translated version, on the
semantic, emotive, socio-cultural or psychological plane.
Literary translation seems to be a replacement of the closest synonymous
expressions and results in what is labeled as ‘transliteration’. On the contrary, the
transmission of the content and jeopardizing the sense for the sake of form tends to
become ‘transcreation’.
To illustrate the scope of possibilities and impossibilities, a literary work
availed in its two translated versions, can be observed and commented on.
Amrita Pritam’s autobiography The Revenue Stamp is accessible in all
languages of India, and commented herein with special reference to Marathi-the
regional version, and Hindi-the national one. These two versions are studied
herein with a focus on the following measures:
1) Translation as transliteration
2) Translation as transcreation
3) Translation as a compromise with impossibilities and
4) Translation as a way of interrelation between two languages.
 Translation As Transliteration
In the attempt of translation, many a times the translator tends to
paraphrase or replace the closest synonymous wordings and produce
transliteration. Rasidi Ticket in Marathi , translated by Murlidhar Shah, seems
to be a transliterated version in many expressions.
For instance – the reference to ‘doomsday’ occurs in Hindi as ‘Kayaamat’while
in Marathi it is replaced with ‘Kalpaantacha diwas’,(p.1) for which a better
Marathi word should have been ‘Pralay’. There is a statement in Hindi, “ Mei
khush hoon , maine samaadhi ke chaen ka vardaan nahin paaya; bhatkan ki
bechaenee ka shaap paaya hai ”which is literally reproduced in Marathi- “ Mee
sukhi ahe mala ashaa samaadhichya chaenicha vardaan milale naahi;
bhataknyachya bechaenicha shaap milala ”.
There is a phrase ‘ sukhi ahe’that dilutes the intense emotional sense
implied in ‘khush hoon’ since these two words are not synonymous in usage.
‘Sukhi’is an expression of material comfort which relates the physicality of
pleasure rather than mind. ‘Khush’is a word that signifies a shade of mental
experience of pleasure. Translators, in general do not seem to bother about the
deeper shades of meaning and perform their ritual of trans-literation by chiefly
identifying phonetic and structural value of the content rather than the semantic
one. It is because they do not know the idiom of both the languages. They
forget the emotive dimension of meaning which I. A. Richards emphasized in
practical criticism, relating the cognitive sense of language.
Translation As Transcreation
In actual process of translating a work from the source language to the
target language, if a translator is seriously concerned with multiplicity of the
shades of meaning and accuracy of implication, he or she is in danger of doing
transcreation – a tendency of adding original sense to the existing one. Even
this can be illustrated by some examples in Amrita Pritam’s two versions of the
text.
1) Tumhare gahano ki chhata kitani bhayanak !
Jaise koi kabra mein utarata jaaye …..
Trans.-Tuzya alankaaranchi chhata kiti bhayanak !
Janu kunache thandgaar kabarit utarane….
The addition of the word ‘thandgaar’is transcreated shade of the original Hindi
expression without it.
2) Mil gayi thi ism ek boond tere eeshk ki
Isliye maine umra ki saari kadwahat pee li !
Par aaj iss mahfil me baithe hue muze lag raha hai
Ki meri umra ke pyale me Insaani pyaar ki bahut-si
 boonde mil gayi hai aur umra ka pyaala meetha ho gaya hai !
Trans.- Tuzya premacha ek bindu misalala hota tyat (themb-?)
Mhanun mee ayushyachi sari katuta piun gele
Pan aaj ya maifalit baslyawar mala watla ki
Mazya ayushyachya pyaalyat lokanchya premache khupse
bindu misalale ahet wa to pyaala amrutmay zalay !
The alteration from ‘boond’to ‘bindu’is not simply a diversion of sense from
poetic to the prosaic but also a very carelessly attended phonetic identification.
Again the phrases like ‘ Insaani pyaar ki’converted in ‘lokanchya premache’
appears to be rudely paraphrased without paying any heed to the
broad sense of the original connotations.
Translation as a compromise with impossibilities
The dual experimentation of possible and impossible, logical and empirical
alterations in the act of translation is based on the primary assumptions like
1)verbal expression can be changed without altering the sense and 2)the
semantically equivalent forms do exist in the interactions of diverse languages.
Amrita Pritam’s text is a useful version for observing how translation proves a
compromise with impossibilities of finding equivalent linguistic forms :
1) Kahte hai ek aurat thi . Usne bade sachche mun se kisi se muhabbat ki.
Ek bar uske premi ne uske balo mei laal gulab ka phool atka diya. Tab
aurat ne muhabbat ke bade pyare geet likhe ! (p.32).
Trans- asa sangtat ki ek stree hoti. Tine agdi kharya munane ekawar prem
kela . tichya priyakarane tichya kesat gulabache phool khowla. Tya streene
tyanantar premachi anek gaani lihilee….(p.32).
‘Bade sachche munse’ is damaged in ‘agdi kharya munane’ and ‘bade pyare
geet’ dilutes in ‘premachi anek gaani’. A better suggestion for these phrases
would have been impossible for the regional usage of Marathi, which happens
to be geographically limited and so, in the space for translatability of usage.
Translation from a national speech to a regional one proves a compromise with
impossibilities for logical, lexical, creative and semantically specified
expressions. It inclines towards lexicalization of expression and thematization
of content.
Translation as a way of Inter-relating two languages
In bilingual practice of linguistic conversion, translation as a compression of
comparable content can be formalized in the interrelationship of involved
languages. For Hindi and Marathi – both being genetically closer to Sanskrit,
share some primary affinity of structural and conceptual aspects. This affinity
can be pinpointed in brief, with the help of Amrita Pritam’s text in the two
versions :
 Hindi Marathi same words
1) Iss nagar mei bhi ya nagrithi swapna yetat. Nagar
sapne ate hai. kitna wicharanchi dare kitihi wichar
wicharoke dwar band band Keli tari, aat band .
karo phir bhi bhitar aa yetatach. Tu mazya Itihaas, paatra
jate hai. Itihaasacha kasla paatra , Roz, Taarikh
2) 2) Tu mere Itihaas ka ahes Tu roz tyachi taarikh badal. atmakatha
kaisa paatra hai, Tu badaltos. (p.139). ekangi
roz uski taarikh atmakathela bahutanshi atmashlagha
badalta hai. (p.136) zagzagat aslela ekangi kalatmak madhyam.
3) Atmakatha ko prayaha satya manla jate
chamakti damakti atmashlaghecha ek
ekangi sachchai samza kalatmak
jata hai, atmashlagha Madhyam…………
ka kalatmak
madhyam….

In these two examples, everything appears to be the same except the verb-
structure and prepositions. In these instances one can see the words that form
the same meaning in the same form through both the languages, despite their
grammatical and morphological alterations. In a much generalized perspective,
translation becomes an initiative towards inter-relating languages with more or
less degree of accuracy in expression. One cannot indeed find another easier
medium of connectivity for linguistic interrelationships. Translation, to sum up
in simpler terms, is the communicative means of practically establishing a sense
of continual interrelation between different languages.
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References: 1)Pritam Amrita, Rasidi Ticket , Revised edition, 1999, Kitaab
Ghar, New Delhi. All Hindi quotations are adopted from this edition.
2)Pritam Amrita, Rasidi Ticket, Trans. Murlidhar Shah, Shriwidya Prakashan,
Pune, 1984. All Marathi quotes are taken from this edition.
3)N.R.Vasandani, The Translation Initiative, CIEFL, Hyderabad. This journal
edited by N.R.Vasandani is referred for general perspective.
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Dr. Bhagyashree S. Varma
Head, P.G.Dept. of English,
People’s College,
S.R.T.M. University
Nanded. (Maharashtra).