Neither sahib nor memsahib

In Konkani there is no formal version of the pronoun you, like the aap that exists in Hindi or aapan in Marathi.

So, I am tu to everyone in the village - whether it’s the girl who cleans my home, the rough labour I might hire to do some work, or the little girl who steals the flowers from my garden.

I shouldn’t find this offensive: after all, I speak English, which has only one pronoun for you. Yet, often, I find I don’t like it. And it’s not so much to do with respect or deference. It’s the over familiarity implied by the word tu that I object to. Tu in Marathi, Hindi and other Indian languages (even French, incidentally) is used only by those who know you well. To be called tu by a stranger always comes as a bit of a shock.

And yet, this only tells one part of the story.

In her insightful book, Goa: A daughter’s story, Maria Aurora Couto writes how the lack of the more formal you in Konkani has contributed to a unique culture of egalitarianism in the state.

But language alone is not responsible, she writes. Traditionally, the system of holding land – whether agricultural or village - was non-exploitative, with village gaonkars (the elite) representing the entire village, including non-gaonkars and new settlers, all of whom were accommodated on community land. The Portuguese too, unlike the British, did not encourage a culture of subservience. So Goans, according to Couto, never had to learn how to bow before authority.

Even today one is told repeatedly that there are no servants in Goa. The concept simply doesn’t exist. The girl who cleans my house not only calls me tu, she calls me by my first name - without appending a jee or even a madamjee. And if I offer her something to drink, she does not sit down on the floor to drink it, as domestic help anywhere else in India will automatically do. She sits in a chair.

In a strange way, I like it. She's clean, polite and pleasant. She helps me out by cleaning the house and in return I gratefully pay her some money.

If only Indians elsewhere would stop bowing their heads in deference to caste, class, money, authority and status, what an extraordinary difference it would make to the very fabric of society. No memsahibs, no sahibs. Instead, a natural respect for all.