Language editions and translation
ALOKE THAKORE
The India Today issue of 5 February and the India Today (Hindi) of 7 February, 2007 presents a rather unique case of journalistic mimesis. Suggesting anything otherwise would be impertinent. Mr Aroon Purie’s signed editorial on page 5 of the English edition and Mr Prabhu Chawla’s signed editorial on page 4 of the Hindi edition read the same with very minor changes. Granting that the substance of both the pieces deals with the same story, the mirroring of ideas, the flow of sentences, even the placement of quotes, would all lead one to believe that at least one of them was plagiarising or both were affixing signatures to ghost written editorials; especially, since both these esteemed gentlemen choose to end the pieces with a signature flourish. Or may be it is just the mode of operations that the Hindi edition is accustomed to since the magazine that has a different registration number than the English one chooses to do nothing more than translate all the pieces that make it to the English edition.
The contrast with Outlook Saptahik could not be greater. While sharing the same design and photo team, as evidenced by the masthead, the English newsmagazine and the Hindi newsmagazine are two different reads, which provide the reader with different sets of information, news, and views. The choice of stories, the columnists, the reporters located in the Hindi speaking states, all denote and the magazine certainly bears out the desire to be a Hindi newsmagazine that has the same name as an English newsmagazine, comes from the same stable, and that seems to leverage the same marketing and distribution strengths. What the magazine is not is a translation job.
India Today, on the other hand, seems to leverage all that Outlook seems to be doing with nothing more than a translation desk and a few copy hands thrown in. The contrast in mastheads of the English and Hindi are for all to see. So we have the spectacle of seeing bylines in the Hindi edition of people who in all likelihood would not be able to write a grammatically correct sentence in that language. The bane of such journalism by translation is widespread. Many Hindi newspapers regularly carry columnists whose writings are translated into Hindi. It would have been just fine if the views that these columnists were sharing were either of a quality or kind that is unavailable in Hindi. And that thankfully is not the case either in substantive knowledge or literary skills, both of which abound in speakers and writers of Hindi or for that matter in any other Indian language. The fact that it is cheaper to hire translators is another matter.
While such an operation might be cost effective, the disrespect it shows the reader of the Hindi edition could not be greater. The journalism that is presented is finally neither written keeping in mind a Hindi reader nor is it written as an original piece. It is a translation in that most sorry sense of that act, something that is there to satiate the curiosity when it is not difficult to get people to report, write, and edit something keeping in mind the lived language of the readers. The difference in the content of the Hindi edition of India Today and Outlook Saptahik makes it evident which is a Hindi newsmagazine despite some translations and which is a palliative served to those who are familiar with a brand name called India Today even when some pieces are written exclusively for it. Unless one believes that the editorial quality of India Today English is of such a stellar, or more appropriately an oracular, quality that readers of other languages, including Hindi, are waiting to read what it was that was writ.
The contrast with Outlook Saptahik could not be greater. While sharing the same design and photo team, as evidenced by the masthead, the English newsmagazine and the Hindi newsmagazine are two different reads, which provide the reader with different sets of information, news, and views. The choice of stories, the columnists, the reporters located in the Hindi speaking states, all denote and the magazine certainly bears out the desire to be a Hindi newsmagazine that has the same name as an English newsmagazine, comes from the same stable, and that seems to leverage the same marketing and distribution strengths. What the magazine is not is a translation job.
India Today, on the other hand, seems to leverage all that Outlook seems to be doing with nothing more than a translation desk and a few copy hands thrown in. The contrast in mastheads of the English and Hindi are for all to see. So we have the spectacle of seeing bylines in the Hindi edition of people who in all likelihood would not be able to write a grammatically correct sentence in that language. The bane of such journalism by translation is widespread. Many Hindi newspapers regularly carry columnists whose writings are translated into Hindi. It would have been just fine if the views that these columnists were sharing were either of a quality or kind that is unavailable in Hindi. And that thankfully is not the case either in substantive knowledge or literary skills, both of which abound in speakers and writers of Hindi or for that matter in any other Indian language. The fact that it is cheaper to hire translators is another matter.
While such an operation might be cost effective, the disrespect it shows the reader of the Hindi edition could not be greater. The journalism that is presented is finally neither written keeping in mind a Hindi reader nor is it written as an original piece. It is a translation in that most sorry sense of that act, something that is there to satiate the curiosity when it is not difficult to get people to report, write, and edit something keeping in mind the lived language of the readers. The difference in the content of the Hindi edition of India Today and Outlook Saptahik makes it evident which is a Hindi newsmagazine despite some translations and which is a palliative served to those who are familiar with a brand name called India Today even when some pieces are written exclusively for it. Unless one believes that the editorial quality of India Today English is of such a stellar, or more appropriately an oracular, quality that readers of other languages, including Hindi, are waiting to read what it was that was writ.
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