I am from Hindi Medium

English is a big deal in a country where it is a secondary language. Yet, this is not the best excuse NOT to learn it. In the same way having a Hindi (or any other language) background is not the best excuse for not working hard on English!

‘Sir, I am from Hindi Medium’, comes with much humility from the student who feels bogged down by the presence of ‘English Medium’ candidates competing against him in the MBA-Entrance race. The other day, this guy from my morning CAT-11 batch shared with me his frustration about not being able to do much progress with reading comprehension.

So I decided to make him see the real picture. I posed a few questions which now I wish to pose again for all those who are reading this.

1) *Is having a Hindi Study background a sin? (And even if it is, how does it matter?)

2) *Does belonging to Hindi Medium mean that you are dumb?

3) *Have you never come across English even once in your life before?

As my student tried answering these questions, he also realized that this was exactly how he was looking at it. And he needed to change the attitude first before he practically started working on his English. Before spilling out my share of gyaan on how to work on your English, I want to tell you my dear students that somehow you are dearer to us than those who have an English medium background. The reason is that you are more open to learning and don’t suffer from complacency (self-satisfaction) about Verbal Ability. Always remember:

1) * Hindi Study background DOES NOT mean that you are less intelligent than those belonging to English Medium.

2) * If you deal with English just like the way you deal with a tougher subject, you can still master it.

3) * English requires something that any other difficult subject does: PRACTICE!

4) * Everything seems difficult at first. It gets manageable ONLY by spending more time with it and paying more attention to it.

Yet, you don’t have to believe me. Instead, believe in a logic. I shall give you my own example here. I am not an engineer, have no other technical degree. Till last year, I used to be a freelance writer who wrote mainly website content of consumer goods and services or scripts for walk-throughs and corporate films. A company asked me to write their technical content including their product/service portfolios. This company creates several softwares for e-business and websites; designs websites with high-end technology facilities and increases traffic on client websites through social media marketing and search engine optimisation. My first reaction was a big NO. I am not a trained technical writer. I have no certificate or degree in instruction design (one level up of technical writing). There was no way I was doing it.

But the company CEO made me start working with him. He said I don’t need any technical degree to write their website content or edit their technical documents. I started with simple re-writing and grammar corrections of their content. Steadily, I started asking questions like : Is Ajax a software or a framework? How does PHP programming different from Zend? A few questions were obvious, some stupid, others intelligent. Yet I ASKED THEM. I didn’t shrink from the thought of making a total fool of myself. Today, I am confident I can edit any part of their content, technical or non-technical.

So what’s my point? My point is that a year before, technical writing seemed to me the way English seems to all of you from the Hindi medium background. And just as I refused to give up and kept writing, you need to do that too. That’s because unless you do, you can never think of crossing this language hurdle ever in your life.

I would suggest that you too start with some basic practice. This includes solving all the grammar concepts/exercises and get your doubts solved. I would say start with Subject-Verb Agreement. Do the following on a regular basis:

1) * Read a few English pieces from newspaper or concepts books aloud for 15 minutes daily. Why? So that you improve your pronunciation and develop a comfort level with English speaking.

2) * Read two RC passages in a day, even if that takes you half a day. Find out word meanings, write them. Solve questions, find out why a few went wrong. Analyse your progress.

3) * Write a Daily Journal. Write in English how you spent a day, what you did, where you went etc. Get it checked from a VA faculty at CHEM. Pay attention to the corrections made. Then next day, write the day’s work again. Track your progress. Then read that piece over and over again. Then keep your notebook aside and now repeat what you read from it. Next time when someone asks you to tell your daily routine, you will easily answer that in English.

4) * The above point also means that once you learn to speak ‘rehearsed’ matter confidently, it will boost your confidence manyfolds and then you will be prepared to deal with unexpected situations. Makes sense?

5) * Pick an easy English novel or a non-fiction. Try to finish it in a week’s time. Write a summary of it and get it checked by a VA faculty.

6) * Create your own sentences from the words from the wordlist. Maintain a notebook. Revise old words weekly and read at least 10 new words daily. ( Also read my blog: A twist in the wordlist tale. )

7) * Learn to love English. When you love something, you don’t get bored with it, you truly enjoy it.

Sounds difficult? You are not mistaken. So now I want to tell you how I, as a sixth-grader learnt to comprehend Sanskrit. At first when we came across Sanskrit in school, we were dead sure that even if we cram the shlokas, we will never be able to comprehend the Sanskrit passages. But our dear teacher Mrs Neeti Dwivedi gave us a rule: It’s a language. Lets start with basics and then the way you learnt Hindi, you will learn Sanskrit too. Six months after she said this, I found myself easily comprehending Sanskrit passages. How did I do it? I just followed three simple rules, that you may now follow if you want to learn English:

1) READ: Read aloud in that language. Try to make sense by breaking bigger sentences.

2) WRITE: Write regularly in that language. At times, a quotation you liked or simply a small paragraph in that language.

3) LISTEN: Listen things in that language. In case of English, watch one Hollywood movie (not the Hindi-dubbed) in a week. Download English songs. Watch motivational English videos online. Watch English news channels.

Why should you do this?

1) * You want to compete in MBA-entrance race. No B-school in this country has MBA course books in Hindi or any regional language. How will you understand them?

2) * You want to have good communications skills. Speaking good Hindi is not enough, you must be able to speak in English too.

3) * You want to be like that smart English-speaking guy or gal who looks so confident.

I am not saying this is easy. But that doesn’t mean you must not attempt it. This process is going to frustrate you, bother you, leave you sleepless and restless. It would be like a dark tunnel on a railway track. You won’t see much unless you go half way through it. Then you shall see a beam of light entering it and then before you knew it, you would be out of it as a winner. So get set and get started. For queries, we are always there to help you. Feel free. Speak to us. Share your problems. We promise to help you. God Bless.

muktimasih@yahoo.com

Do comment on what you feel about what I wrote. Feel free to share your problems, apprehensions even insecurities here.