Why are almost all Hindi news channels so excitable? Why do they brim over with passion about every subject, be it the marriage blues of some unfortunate couple, Rakhis stage shows and the hourly performance of the Indian cricket team ? In the name of news they rave and rant and go entirely with the flow of events, rather than cast a critical eye on them. The world becomes a spectator sport and news readers become the commentators whose role is to make us, the viewers feel the excitement sitting in our homes. There is little need felt to provide perspective for that calls for an ability to detach oneself from the event and examine it dispassionately.
Come to think of it, why are Hindi sports commentators so excitable? The difference in the English and Hindi versions of the commentary is startling. The Hindi commentator sees the game as perpetually exciting and believes in magnifying every moment through the sheer force of lilt. The sound of the commentary communicates more than the meaning of the words it contains, and it is easy to figure out what is happening by listening to the cadence of the radio commentator even if one cannot catch the words. Typically, the Hindi commentator is much more comfortable on radio than television, for he is at his best when he has the full burden of communicating not only what is happening on the ground but the feeling that it generates. On television, he needs to account for the fact that we are privy to what his happening; his role is to underline, analyse, point out and provide perspective, things that do not seem to come with great ease.
Now it cannot be that all people who choose to commentate in Hindi lack the ability to provide perspective or that all those who speak in English are cold fish unmoved by the events that unfold around us. Could be that the two languages and the cultures they represent, see the world in fundamentally different ways?
At first glance, this is a preposterous proposition. How can the language one speaks change the content of what one is saying? There are great analytical thinkers who express themselves in Hindi just as English has its share of emotionally expressive writers. But while language may not entirely determine the nature of discourse carried out in it, could it play some role in it? Take for instance, how in the world of advertising, Hindi slogans have an uncanny need to rhyme. The Ek Ya Do Bachche, Ghar mein hote hain acchhe school of tag lines continues to this day.
Given the oral nature of our culture, it is easy to see why rhyme was so important for it was a device to preserve memory. The Hanuman Chalisa, the dohas, the singing/chanting of shlokas in a prescribed lilt, the reciting of the pahadas to learn multiplication all point to the need to keep memory in tact in a world where things were not written down and where few people could read.
The effects of orality might well be behind the natural slant of Hindi news channels and commentary. The spoken word resides in a world that is totally immersed in the present; when we speak we are always in the moment, we cannot but have a ball-by-ball view of the world. When we write, we do so with retrospective detachment, we use logic, we sequence our argument, building it step by step. When we speak we do so with emotion and gesticulations, we repeat ourselves for effect, meander when we think of something else. Logic is not that critical; the emotional force and intent behind what we are saying is.
Comedy in Hindi too is largely involved with voices and sounds. Wit does not come naturally; the pun is extremely rare for both are measured manipulations of the mind. The Hindi comedy serial relies on people speaking funnily rather being funny; the comedian historically needed to look and speak like one.
So when the Hindi news channels speak in such a distinctive voice from their English counterparts, it might not be an accident. There might be a natural tendency that comes not from the people running these channels but from the language that they speak in.
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