From Mami to Kaku: The Indian tradition we shouldn’t lose

It has been a little over a year since we lost our eldest niece, Shalini. Born and raised in Canada, she was quirkily Bengali and Indian in a myriad of ways though she was hardly a frequent visitor to the Motherland. And one of the many endearing ways she maintained that desi-ness was her punctiliousness when it came to addressing members of our widely dispersed clan. Moreover, she made sure that her Irish-Canadian husband Bryne and two sons imbibed that sanskar.

For some it may sound awkward to hear a Canadian-accented conversation peppered with Mami, Jethu, Pishi and Kaku but they roll off the tongue of our jamai (son-in-law) Bryne with disarming and heartwarming ease. And thanks to his careful nurturing of that Indianness, the sons are also keeping alive their mother's quixotic, sometimes misplaced, but utterly genuine fascination and love for India, Bengal and our entire relationship-centric culture.

Our nephew-in-law is only five years younger than me; he could have justifiably called me by my name, in keeping with the practice of his culture. After all, calling in-laws by their names and regarding only immediate relatives as "family" are perfectly acceptable over there. Yet he instinctively realised that our tradition of suffixes widens and deepens the familial embrace. He lost his wife too early - a year short of their 25th anniversary - but not her family.


It is now quite fashionable in some Indian circles to adopt western habits and precepts, which includes discarding honorifics and the specific familial suffixes that once bound us across generations in mutual respect. In high school I was once immeasurably embarrassed when a classmate's parents nonchalantly asked all of us to call them by their first names. Something inside me simply refused to consider going down that path, much to their amusement.

Even in circles beyond the family, this Indian tradition adds a human touch to many otherwise cut-and-dried hierarchical relationships. At least up to my generation and the next in our milieu, we were brought up with this precept. So, no matter what their profession or duties, familial titles were routinely extended to all those within the ambit of regular contact. The 'Ramu Kaka' family retainer character of old Hindi movies is an exemplar of this practice.

Although India has 'modernised' (if it can be called that) and using first names across generations is quite prevalent now, somewhere deep down, discomfort remains about it. During the recently concluded elections in West Bengal, for instance, a social media campaign launched by a few Anglicised members of Parliament in which they called the prime minister and home minister by their first names only, fell absolutely flat. Indianness prevailed.

Irritation at strangers addressing people in India (or Indians) summarily by their first names without being given leave to do so - even in a professional context - is rooted in that tradition. A friend of my son's who went to college in the US and worked there for a while recently got in touch for some project but dropped the "Aunty" suffix he had always used as a boy. Maybe he was simply following American norms of "professional" conduct, but it annoyed me.

A core tenet of Indian culture is 'Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam' or 'the world is one family'. A corollary of this belief is relationships and respect for age that connects us to not only our families but everyone we are in contact with. Of the many things that our fractious world can learn from India, this is the most beneficial. We should not discard it either, in pursuit of professionalism or modernity. If an Irish-Canadian can be so Indian in this respect, so can we all.