Dharna – placing your backside down

Master linguist Khaled Ahmed explains the etymology of the word.

KARACHI: With Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf Dharna taking place in Karachi today and tomorrow, my sister asked in exasperation, what does Dharna mean and where does it comes from.

There was only one person I know who could answer that question, the master linguist Khaled Ahmed. His book ‘Word for Word: Stories behind everyday words we use’ (OUP 2010) is a fun romp through our history.

Ahmed explained over the telephone that ‘Dharna’ means ‘act of faith’.

Dhar means ‘to carry something’ or ‘to place something’ as in ‘to place your faith’. It is a Sanskrit word.

When Krishna is called ‘murli dhar’ he is carrier of the murli. ‘Dhiri dhar’ is carries the mountain, similarly. Dhar-na is to carry faith, then.

It also means ‘putting down’ or ‘dhar do’ as well.

When I asked Ahmed whether it came from India, as it is a Sanskrit word, he laughed and kindly explained that, no, we got it first from the Aryans who came to the region of Pakistan first.

In the Urdu mohaavra it is ‘wo dharna maar ke bet’h gaya’ or -- he squatted or placed his backside down.

I have a feeling that Imran Khan won’t exactly be doing this over the weekend. He’ll probably be standing and giving speeches, ‘carrying the faith’.