Dear ALUP friends, aadaab.

Recently a shi3r was posted in another thread which drew a certain response from Raj Kumar SaaHib.

3azmat-i-mulk is siyaasat ke
haath niilaam ho rahii hai ab

"muHaavare ke mutaabiq ko'ii cheez kisii ke "haath" niilaam nahiiN hotii, kisii ke "haathoN" niilaam hoti hai. is she'r meN agar kahiiN par "haath" likkhaa gayaa hai to Ghalat likkhaa gayaa hai."

I am starting this thread to generate some thoughts and discusion on this topic. Languages such as Sanskrit, Old Persian, Greek and Latin had a rich case system where the word ending was indicative of whether the word was the subject, object and so on of a verb. Traditionally, eight main cases are talked about. These are:

Nominative: Gives the subject
Accusative: Provides the object
Dative: Tells us what is given
Genitive: Gives us the possession concept (e.g 3ishq kaa tiir, baab-i-suxan)
Locative: As the name applies, the location of something *zindagii meN* to sabhii pyaar karte haiN
Ablative: Provides us with the source. *dil se* sabr-o-qaraar jaataa hai
Instrumental: Answers the question, "With what?"....*shamshiir se*
Vocative: Used for the one who is addressed, e.g. *xudaayaa*, *ai mere paak vatan* etc

These classical languages had an "ending" to a noun to express these eight concepts whereas Urdu, a Sanskrit based language, has lost most if not all of these case endings and makes do with postpositions such as "ne", "ko", "kaa/kii/ke", "par/meN", "se" etc. But have these endings completely died out? The answer is no. We still have reminants of them in places.

Those of us who know Punjabi will know that..

"saRke" means on/along the road, as in "saRke saRke jaandiye muTiyaare nii...."

"savere" (both Punjabi and Urdu) means "In the morning"
"raatiiN" implies "At night", "shaamiiN" mean "In the evening".
"akkhiiN surmah" Collyrium in the eyes
"kanniiN kaaNTe" Pendants in the ears

These examples above demonstrate the "locative" case.

k_haroN – From home (Ablative)

In Urdu, we still have the "-e" ending as in "savere" and Platts has "ulTe chor kotvaale DaaNDe/DaaNTe" but I think this is frozen in time and such constructions are no longer in vogue. One ending that is still in vogue is the "oN" ending, as in the title of this thread.

"duudhoN nahaa'o, puutoN phalo"

puutoN phalnaa tujhe aur duudhoN nahaanaa ho nasiib
biyaah ho sone ke sihre se, tirii 3umr daraaz

Insha Allah Khan Insha (1756-1817)

I presume this benediction means, "duudh meN nahaa'o aur puutoN meN/ke saath phalo.

Getting back to the original shi3r..

3azmat-i-mulk is siyaasat ke
haathoN niilaam ho rahii hai ab

Here "haathoN" is to be understood as "through/by" in the "instrumental" sense, just like "Raavan, Ram ke haathoN maaraa gayaa".

Here is another one although I am not sure how to link it to the case system.

barchhoN uR jaataa hai dab dab ke faras raanoN se
aaNkh laR jaatii hai daryaa ke nigahbaanoN se

Munis

"barchhaa" is a "lance" or "spear". So here, I assume "barchhoN" implies the height of many spears just as "laakhoN" implies "ka'ii laakh".

In the month of Ramzaan, one must n't forget...bhuukoN marnaa!:-)

Naseer