All For The Love of Tulu! Malayali Mohammed U Promotes Tulu through Diwali Crackers
All For The Love of Tulu! Mohammed Usman- hailing from a Malayali Family in Kasaragod-Kerala Promotes Tulu through sale of Diwali Crackers
Mangaluru: Even though born in a Malayali family in Kasaragod-Kerala, Mohammed Usman who moved to Mangaluru 20 years ago, has developed great love towards Tulu language, that he spends in lakhs on printing booklets/brochures to promote Tulu among his customers, school and college students, commuters in Bus-stands and Railway stations and other busy locations- and he has been doing this for the past six years. Owning a crackers shop named “Indian Pataki” in the City, he distributes these pamphlets/booklets containing Tulu scripts to all his customers.
Mohammed has printed over one lakh four-page brochures containing Tulu script, spending nearly Rs 1.75 lakhs, and until now has already distributed around 1.25 lakh copies to his customers, and also people in Mangaluru. He has assigned the job of distributing these booklets around the city, to three of his shop workers who are happy to do it- and also everyone who comes to his crackers shop also get a copy of this booklet. He not only distributes these booklets in and around Mangaluru, but also in his hometown Kasaragod, so that people there may also learn the Tulu script, which would be useful for them, in case they move to Tulunadu-Kudla sooner or later.
When asked if he does this Tulu promotion only during Diwali time, he replied. ” No, I do it all year long, irrespective any festival or event”. Narrating his love for Tulu and his efforts in promoting it Mohammed said, ” Even though I come from a Malayali family, I have great respect and love for Tulu language which has done so much for me after settling in Kudla. Therefore I started to promote Tulu language and popularize it. Since Tulu is a Dravidian language with a lot of historic prominence, I suggest that every child in this region should learn the Tulu script and it will go a long way in their future. While we live in Tulunadu, why not make it a point to learn the Tulu language”.
When asked if he has promoted Tulu language among his dozens of employees at his shop, he said “Yes I have, and they have shown a keen interest in learning, which has made it easy for them to communicate with the customers when they come into our shop. And one should know that Tulu, is a Dravidian language spoken by around 2 million native speakers mainly in the South West Part of Karnataka and in the Kasaragod district-Kerala which is collectively known as Tulu Nadu. And we people living in Tulunadu should learn Tulu without any fuss and hesitance”.
When asked whether he would continue this promotion of Tulu language, he smilingly said, “Why not? I will continue to serve and promote the Tulu script in future too, as long as I am able to do it. And if I get more support from the citizens to promote this language it would surely be an added advantage. To all my Hindu friends and customers I extend my heartfelt Diwali greetings”.
