Untitled - socium.ge

412 Anshu Chatterjeeproduced institutions which did not encourage collaboration between thecommunity’s religiously diverse social and political elites. Whereas thelanguage movement in Kerala was able to provide a unifying symbol, themovement in Punjab became secondary due to political competition amongthe three Punjabi communities.As part of historical democratization and social reform processes, PunjabiMuslims, Hindus, and Sikhs sought to differentiate themselves through the useof religious symbols. Urdu became a political symbol for the Muslims as theyassociated themselves with the elite culture of pre-colonial Mughal administration,which utilized Urdu as an official language. Meanwhile, Hindu reformmovements seeking cultural symbols chose Hindi in order to differentiatethemselves from British and Muslim cultural symbols. Consequently, largesections of Punjabi-speaking Hindus and Muslims turned away from theirmother tongue in order to rally behind Hindi and Urdu, leaving few resourcesfor the promotion of Punjabi or its cultural industries, including its mediasector. In the post-independence phase, this linkage between the region’s politicaland religious organizations continued. The Punjabi religious communitiesdeveloped their exclusive media after the partition, reflecting their politicallanguage preferences and, thus, dividing up resources and audience in theprocess.The history of the Punjabi press reveals the consequences of social andpolitical competition between the three religious communities (see Jeffrey,1997b). Urdu’s previous status meant that many of the Muslim, Hindu, andSikh elites were educated in the language. Punjabi, on the other hand, was thelanguage of the home for these communities, the marketplace, and Sikh religiousactivities. As a result, Punjab’s press was predominantly Urdu orEnglish, avoiding the major vernacular. Promotion of Punjabi, meanwhile,became the limited domain of some scholars and the Sikh religious communityfor religious services. After the partitioning of India, in which the westernparts of Punjab became a part of Pakistan, the Urdu press continued to operatein India’s Punjab because it still enjoyed a large non-Muslim Urdu readership.Punjabi remained the language of the home and the marketplace. Thestatus of Punjabi changed in 1966 after the region was reorganized alonglanguage lines. The new state instituted an educational system whichpromoted Punjabi and encouraged literary societies and programs that werealso assisted by a central policy of support for regional languages.Consequently, the Punjabi press did not emerge until the 1960s. The historyof two newspapers in Punjab reveals the consequences of these movements onthe region’s media. In the newly structured state, Ajit, initially established as aUrdu newspaper in the pre-independence Punjab, transformed into a Punjabipaper in 1960. Its founder, Sadhu Singh Hamdard expected an increase inPunjabi readership due to the change in the education system. His motivations