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Language won't muzzle Patnaik as Orissa CM

M I Khan in Bhubaneswar

So tell, can Orissa afford a chief minister who can't speak its lingo?

Naveen Patnaik, Biju Janata Dal chief and socialite turned politician, is sure to occupy the chair in a few days time. But, as we had reported earlier, he doesn't speak Oriya. Will that hamper his functions as the CM?

Naturally, BJD leaders said no, not at all. "The party is here to assist him," they pointed out. And added, "It is not at all an issue. People in the state were well aware that Patnaik has a little problem speaking Oriya. But still he got a spectacular victory."

That claim thus standing, rediff.com approached other politicians and people from different walks of life. The majority were optimistic that Patnaik would overcome his "little problem" by quickly learning Oriya.

Of course, there were critics. "How can Naveen Patnaik deal with the ground level problems of rural Orissa without knowing the language?" asked Sanjay Mishra, a student. Despite his pessimism, he had voted for the BJD-Bharatiya Janata Party combine.

Mishra was not alone. Many youths of his age felt that if the chief minister cannot communicate with the people in their own language, it would definitely affect his efforts.

Senior Indian Administrative Service official Dr Satish Balaram Agnihotri, however, believed that Patnaik would face no problem on this count. He understands Oriya, he pointed out, and there's the whole state machinery to help him out.

"Most of the urgent notes sent to chief minister are usually in English," he said.

Another IAS officer, however, didn't believe that matters would be that easy. Patnaik's plight is a blessing in disguise for government officials and his party leaders, he held, who would exploit his weakness by misinterpreting things.

"There is always the risk that he would commit a mistake or clear a file unknowingly which may create trouble for him," he pointed out.

Agnihotry countered: "The major chunk of files are in English. All confidential and secret documents are in English. So also important files with judicial implications. So how will he face a problem?"

Also, he was highly optimistic that Patnaik would learn Oriya shortly, as most of the non-Oriya IAS officers posted to the state do. He recalled that he had learnt Oriya in just three months.

"Let Patnaik run the government, he will learn it automatically," Agnihotry said.

Another IAS officer supported this view. But hasn't Patnaik been promising to learn the language for the past three years? True, she admitted, but then he was outside the state most of the time.

"Now he will stay here. His routine would include daily interaction with public, so he will get an opportunity to learn the language," she felt.

Banka Behary Das, a former Congress minister who is now an environmentalist, too believed that Patnaik would have no major trouble. "Hardly 10 per cent of the official files are in Oriya," he said.

However, J B Patnaik, Orissa Congress chief and state chief minister for a record 14 years, wasn't at all optimistic. "But if people have elected Naveen Patnaik, I wish him good luck in running the government," he said.

He added that during his last tenure from 1995 to early1999, he had tried his best to make it compulsory that all official files were in Oriya. When he was in office, 40 to50 per cent files at the secretariat level were in the local language.

Another former chief minister and senior Congress leader, Nandini Satpathy came forward to support Patnaik on the language issue.

"Why should there be any difficulty for him in running the govt?" she demanded. "There will absolutely be no difficulty for him because he not only understands Oriya, he speaks it too."

Yes? But wasn't his election speeches mostly in Hindi?

"He will pick up the language slowly," she maintained.

There are a number Union ministers who hardly knows English, she said, but they managed to run their department well.

"This kind of problem arises everywhere. If one remembers, veteran Congress leader from Tamil Nadu, the late Kamraj, without knowing to read and write Tamil, ran his state government successfully. So will Naveen," Satpathy was confident.

As for the commoners, many felt that, yes, Patnaik would have a tough time in the beginning. But he would pick up the language soon enough, they were sure.

Patnaik, for his part, hasn't spoken on the matter as yet -- no, not even in English or Hindi.

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