Bhuban Da,
Thank you very much to your enlightening write-up. Its like reading a book on history. You can write a few articles, if not books on your experience and everybody will gain from it.
Regards
Mridul
>From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>To: [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>CC: [email protected]
>Subject: Re: [Assam] Re: Assam Digest, Vol 21, Issue 50
>Date: Thu, 9 Jun 2005 06:38:54 EDT
>
>I am someone who had the opportunity of listening to Indian leaders as well
>as State leaders for many years and occasionally had even been required to
>take notes (verbatim or otherwise). I had occasion to listen to many foreign
>diplomats, journalists, ex-Princeses, academics, etc etc as a Parliamentary
>Fellow for about year in New Delhi. As Editor of the Debates of the Assam
>Legislative Assembly for several years, I also had to check on their utterances
>in four languages to ensure what they said were printworthy. However, I do
>regret that the hand-compositors then didn't follow my corrections most of the
>time; they thought they knew better. That is a bitter story and my
>consequent avulsion to a government manipulated in the interest of a few Secretariat
>clerks (Read assistants for it). I'm not alone; even Nirod Chaudhury did not
>escape a similar victimisation.
>
>It is about Hiteswar Saikia I want to say. He was a lecturer at college
>before he became a leader. Normally this cadre of leaders are good speakers
>because of their natural or acquired facility in communication both in Englilsh
>and Assamese or any other languages for that matter. I can assure you, Mridul,
>Hiteswa Saikia, passed muster. He moved his eyelids in a somewhat abnormal
>way which didn't matter really. They may not be orators or fast English
>language speakers like the average South Indians. In the past the Assam Government
>usually deputed those IAS officers whose delivery was good to hold meetings
>with officials of the Union Ministry.
>
>I didn't know that Gopinath Bordoloi was a good Hindi speaker. That must
>have helped him enormously in participating in the vital discussions before the
>Sixth Schedule became law. I heard him speak in Assamese but not a great
>deal. I think it was in the book Mission with Mountbatten, the author said that
>he once sat next to the Assam's Chief Minister Gopinath Bordoloi at an
>official dinner and found the lattter totally uncommunicative. The reason is not
>far to see. In one confidential report my ex-boss in Assam Oil Company, wrote
>to an English director of the Company that one of the Cabinet Member of Assam
>was a village boy not being able to converse in English. Nothing of the sort.
>In all probablity that Minister did not follow what my boss said to him in a
>meeting. I was a student of St Edmund's College at Shillong. One day one of
>the brothers entered the classroom and talked a few words to the Bengali
>professor who was taking his English class. I was surprised to find that the
>professor was unable to follow what the missionary was saying!
>
>Among the past Chief Ministers whom I had the privilege of hearing speak,
>late Bimala Prasad Chaliha was incomparable. Both his Assamese and English
>were flawless. What people didn't know about him is that he was a great
>intellectual as well as an astute businessman. He spoke slowly but effectively.
>Communication helps form opinions. Late Fakhruddin Ahmed was not a brilliant
>speaker in spite of being a student in England but he was good with his Urdu
>especially in table talk. When a group of Urdu/Hindi speaking MPs visited Assam
>and met Ahmed, one of the visitors shouted: Look here, this Assamese Minister
>is one of us, he is not different from us in any way!
>
>Mahatma Gandhi was certainly a good speaker as vouchafed by the foreign
>visitors. He had to be. He was a successful Barrister-at-law and an editor of an
>English language newspaper. Jinnah was also a Barrsiter-at-law of repute but
>his greatness was thrust upon him while Mahatma Gandhi's lived the life of a
>humanitarian.
>
>Ability to speak in any language effectively is an essential virtue for the
>ambitious in any discipline. But one can do without it. Late Keshab Gogoi who
>was a Cabinet Minister during two ministries and Chief Minister for a short
>period, was a man of very few words. He was a successful criminal lawyer
>professionally. Asked how he succeeded in his profession where primacy to the
>spoken word is paramount, he replied that he concentrated on what was relevant
>and crucial.
>
>Ordinary public speaking and oratory do not go together. Late Mr Rathin Sen,
>an MLA from Cachar who became a Deputy Speaker in the Assam Legislative
>Assembly was an orator. He was a man who could incite a crowd to set fire to a
>public building by his fiery speeches. I didn't see him do that but I saw him
>doing something similar by his unpremeditated speech on one occasion.
>
>He became famous after he delivered a scathing speech during the Official
>Language debate in the State Legislature. The almighty Bengali press deified
>him. But the ability to speak a language fluently could be dangerous at times.
>
>Bhuban
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