Ya
bani Mahaldeeb
Composed
on 17 September 1988
Are
you the same who were called yaalu in Sarandeeb
Ya
bani Mahaldeeb?
Were
you not long ago enslaved by the wicked Portuguese?
O
children of Mahaldeeb?
Did
you not yesterday sail the high seas in tiny
odis of wood and reed?
O
children of Mahaldeeb?
Were
you not utterly helpless when the Borahs wouldn’t
let you feed
O
children of Mahaldeeb?
Did
you not, once upon a time, shiver at the mention
of a name like Farid?
O
children of Mahaldeeb?
Few
in the land before could argue in a foreign
tongue or read
O
children of Mahaldeeb?
And
now you sit in the council of nations and
speak
O
children of Mahaldeeb?
I
could no longer recognise my land or her kateeb
O
children of Mahaldeeb?
Are
you now in a Diaspora like the bani Israel
O
children of Mahaldeeb?
Are
you the same that were once called yaalu in
Sarandeeb
Ya
bani Mahaldeeb?
Author’s
Annotation:
Yaalu,
which literally meant "mate" was
a term used by the Singalese of Sri Lanka
to refer to Maldivians, particularly traders.
Figuratively, the word apparently meant "a
person of no consequence", when it was
used to refer to Maldivians. It was meant
as a racially derogatory term. Scores of trading
vessels called odi, mainly from the southern
atolls, used to sail to Colombo and Galle
in Sri Lanka, were the traders sold their
dried fish, finely woven mats, textiles, coconut
honey and a sweetmeat called bondi and brought
back gems, rice, spices and medicinal herbs.
Mahaldeeb
or "Dhibat el-Mahal" was
what mediaeval Arab traders called the Maldives.
The modern Arabic word for the Maldives is
"Maladeef". The Arabs must
have borrowed the word from ancient Indians
who called the Maldives "Mahila Dipaka"
(Straits Islands) or Mahila Rattam"
(Straits Kingdom). Indian mariners regarded
the channels between the Maldive atolls as
straits. The current Maldive word for the
Maldives is "Divehi Raajje"
(literally means "Insular Kingdom")
and the formal name of State in republican
times is "Divehi Raajjeyge Jumhooriyya"
(literally means the Republic of the Insular
Kingdom". Obviously the reference to
kingdom survived the transition to a republic,
as the modern word for kingdom is "raskan",
as opposed to the archaic term of raajje).
The phrase "Ya bani Mahaldeeb"
means "O Children of the Maldives"
and rhymes with the frequent Koranic phrase
"Ya bani Israel".
Borahs
were Ismaili Moslem Indians of Gujarati extraction
from the British province of Bombay, who first
came to the Maldives as traders in the early
19th century. Maldivians called
them "Bumbaa meehun", which
meant "Bombay people". Soon they
monopolised virtually all, external trade
in and out of Malé. They were expelled
in the early 1960’s.
Farid
refers to the brothers Mohamed and Hassan
Farid Didi. The former was to become the last
Sultan of the Maldives, reigning from 1954
to 1968. The latter was the Deputy Prime Minister,
Minister of the Interior and virtual dictator
in the first government under a written constitution.
He was married to my paternal Aunt Tuttudon
Goma and was presumed drowned when a Japanese
submarine attacked the British warship in
which he was travelling
