Dr Purvaiya Hans
Maharaja Ranbir Singh, the third and only surviving son of Maharaja Gulab Singh, was born in 1830 in the fort of Ramgarh. He ascended the throne as second Maharaja of the erstwhile state of Jammu and Kashmir on 20th February while Maharaja was still alive. Maharaja Ranbir Singh was not only a great administrator but also a great patron of literature and a great builder of temples. He constructed many temples, the most prominent being Sri Raghunath Ji temple and Ranbireshwar temple.
As a result of various reforms made by Maharaja the script became fit for wider official use and for the purpose of litho and typo printing which was extensively done afterwards for preparing book for official use and school studies. He laid great stress on the Dogra cultural renaissance by revival of Dogri script and its popularisation.In order to popularise Dogri and to teach its standardized form to the people, Maharaja Ranbir Singh started a Dogri class in Sri Raghunath Ji temple pathshala. The sons of nobles and respectable citizens were ordered to learn Dogri. Scholars were provided free board, lodging and books and uniforms as an incentive to learn Dogri. The Maharaja used to visit the school every week and himself examined the progress made by each student and used to give awards. Even sudras were also given equal opportunity to get free education. Ten percent was deducted from the salary of such employees in the Government offices who did not possess working knowledge of Dogri.
Dogri, the mother tongue of people in Jammu, was given the status of official language by Centre in 2003 by including it in the Eighth Schedule. Dogri was the 22nd Indian language to be given such recognition. This is for the first time that any Government organisation has used the Dogri script. The then Dogra ruler, Maharaja Ranbir had modified Dogri script and in 1884 CE the first book in Dogri alphabets was published under his aegis. Recognition of Dogri as official language of Jammu and Kashmir was one of the long-awaited demands of the Dogras of Jammu which finally got fulfilled after a wait of several decades.
In this context let us remember the second Dogra Maharaja Ranbir Singh who dedicated his life for the promotion of Dogri language, literature and culture. Maharaja realized the importance of Dogri as a mass media for dissemination of knowledge and education. He gave this language official status by recognizing it as court language on equal status with already existing Persian language. Since the times of Sultan Zain-ul-Abidin of Shah Mir dynasty, Persian language was continued as court language by Mughals, Afghans and Sikhs. It was only Dogras who finally shook off the yoke of foreign rule and introduced Dogri language as soon as they became autonomous.
For promotion of Dogri, Maharaja got its script standardized on the lines of Devanagari script. The modified form of the script came to be known as Namme Dogre Akkhar (New Dogra letters) as against the older version viz., Parane Dogre Akkhar (old Dogra letters). Standardization made the script fit for the purpose of litho and typo printing which was extensively done afterwards for preparing books for official use and school studies. Dogri classes were books started at Raghunath Mandir Pathshala. In this regard authenticity has been provided in the records of Frederic Drew who himself had witnessed the use of Dogri language for official purpose.
Testifying to the extensive official use of Dogri, Mr. Drew writes, “The New Dogri is used for petitions that are read before the Maharaja for this purpose, it has replaced Persian in which petitions were written when I first came to Jammu; but it has generally displaced either Persian or the old Dogri. The old Dogri character is made use of only for writing the Dogri language, it is allowed in certain documents, as in reports from officers of the army, who are of a class by whom Persian is hardly acquired; also, many accounts are kept in duplicate in Persian and Dogri; the accountants of the one class are considered a check on the other, a continuous side by side system of audit being thus carried out.”
Dogri script became so popular under his regime that it was used in all official publications of the state done from Patwari rules, to civil, penal and military codes in force in the state. Many a time publications were made bilingual i.e, in Dogri and Persian. Dogra script was also used in stamp papers, currency, postal stamps and postal obliterations. Not only this, a number of Dogri books were printed for use in schools and public libraries. A new vision was drawn by Baldev Prasad Sharma, the first Dogra to head the Information Service of the State as Principal Information Officer and also the first Dogra to be elevated to the rank of a Station Director of All India Radio, his last posting being Station Director, Radio Kashmir, Jammu from where he retired or January 1, 1967, in context of elevation of Dogri language under the rule of Maharaja Ranbir Singh. He was the first scholar to challenge the statement the well-known linguist Dr. Grierson that neither the Dogri type nor any printed book in Dogri was in existence at the time when he had come to Jammu. Sharma proved that about twenty Dogri books, some of them in Dogri type were actually printed years before Dr. Grierson came to Jammu. These books, Sharma held, established beyond doubt that during the reign of Maharaja Ranbir Singh the Dogri script had been modified and improved. He also located samples of the Dogri type cast during Ranbir Singh’s reign, in Sri Pratap Singh Museum at Srinagar. Sharma also unearthed the Dogri translation “Lilawati” a rare Sanskrit book by famous Indian astronomer and mathematician, Bhaskaracharya. This Dogri book was printed at the “Vidya Vilas Press” Jammu in 1873 CE. Credit goes to Sharma whose discovery established that its translator, JyotshiVisheshwar, the then Principal of Raghunath ji pathshala, was first Dogri writer of Jammu at a time when books were printed by lithographic proces at the “Vidya Vilas Press” and by typographical process at Sri Raghunath Ji Press Jammu in 1884. Another voluminous work “Vyavhar Gita” (an analogy to Bhagavad Gita) was also composed by him. Kaviraj Neelkanth Sharma wrote two Ayurvedic books “Ranbir Chikitsa Sudha Saar” and “Ranbir Prakash” in Dogri script. Sanskrit works like “Amar Kosh” and Persian book “Kareema”were also translated into Dogri. A Dogri school primer “Vidyarthion ki Pratham Partak” was also published. Books on topics like military were also written in Dogri. A book each on Musketeer Regulation and Tent pegging were published in Dogri. Army law and Civil and Criminal laws were published by the names of “Sri Ranbir Sainik Dand Vidhi” and “Sri Ranbir Dand Vidhi” respectively. Maharaja Ranbir Singh followed the footsteps of Avantivarman and Sultan Zain-ul-Abidin, who were former rulers of Kashmir and were of benevolent nature. He employed pandits and maulvis to translate and transliterate religious texts. Sir Aurel Stein catalogued 5,000 such works. Besides religious books, books on medical sciences and mathematics were also translated into Urdu, Dogri and Hindi, as discussed earlier. Maharaja established a Translation Bureau called “Daarul Tarjumah” under the patronage of a learned Hakim of Turkish Afghan ancestry, Agha (Hakim) Muhammad Baqir who was also the Chief physician to the Maharaja. It was under this bureau that Maharaja Ranbir Singh got “Tibb-e-Unaani” translated from Arabic and Latin into Persian and Dogri.
Ranbir Singh was a scholar of Sanskrit and Persian language. He was also fond of speaking Pashto. He conversed with his Afghan bodyguards in Pashto. He established a Sanskrit pathshala in the complex of the Raghunath Temple. Grammar, geometry, philosophy, poetry, algebra, and Vedas were taught in it. Although Ranbir Singh received semi-formal education, he was interested in spreading education amongst the masses. He donated Rs 100,000 (equivalent to 44 million or US $ 610,000 in 2019) to University of the Punjab at the time of its establishment is 1882. In return he was made the first fellow of the university. He frequently met scholars from diverse fields and discussed subjects with them. He was noted as a great scholar of classical Persian and was also learned in Swedish and English.
But unfortunately, after his death, the patronage which Dogri has enjoyed got lost and British pressurized the Government to adopt Urdu as official language. Even after this move, Dogri and Hindi were regularly featured in official stamps of Jammu & Kashmir. Dogri got final blow after the end of Dogra rule and Urdu imposition by successive governments.
Now in present times it is our duty to revive, reclaim and cherish our heritage. Government must take necessary steps for the promotion of Dogri language and Dogri script in Jammu region. Although various measures have been initiated either by the govt. agencies or by individual themselves in order to rejuvenate the lost glory of this language. Recently Dogri Script finds place on signposts at Jammu railway station after fifteen years of its inclusion in Eighth Schedule of the Indian Constitution. These steps somehow trigerred enthusiasm among particularly the youngsters who were in large numbers sharing it on the social media and we hope a bright future of this language in years to come. Adequate steps should be taken to teach this language at the school and college level.
(The author is Assistant Professor, Department of History Govt. Degree College, Sidhra)
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