[本站按]印度已经成为全球最大的外包国家，但是印度的翻译行业却发展得比较缓慢，直到2006年底才成立印度全国的翻译协会。那么印度的翻译市场的现状如何呢？印度翻译协会在推动翻译企业发展方面将起到什么作用呢？本地化世界网最近收到印度翻译协会创始人，现任会长Ravi Kumar先生发来的介绍印度翻译协会的文章，题目为“MAKING OF INDIAN TRANSLATORS ASSOCIATION”，现在本站首发，以飨中国读者。

MAKING OF INDIAN TRANSLATORS ASSOCIATION
By Ravi Kumar (Founder President)

Indian Translators Association, with its head office in New Delhi, is a non- profit body, registration no. 57381/2006, registered on 19th of December 2006 under societies registration act XXI of 1860, Government of India. As per approval of Registrar of societies, the area of operation of the association is whole region of India. The Association aims towards promotion of Translation, Interpretation, Language Teaching and Localization activities in India and abroad by creating a strong network and a vibrant common platform of individuals, agencies, companies and institutions by encouraging and supporting individuals and groups working in this direction and taking lawful measures to facilitate and create environment to achieve the same.

Since few years (when I was a student in Delhi University and later Jawaharlal Nehru University) I have been trying to unite language professionals to create a forceful forum of Indian Translators.
The practical story started in January, 2003 when I started a language professionals club (visit below mentioned link for more details).

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/modlingua/message/140

During that phase of time as a freelancer and student (only direct clients) I approached many well known translators (known for quality work, high price and quick delivery), they were very indifferent to this idea of creating a platform - they justified - since independence India has produced thousands of high profile translators, but no association has been created - dare not to do that or else - you shall be blamed for this noble cause? May be people will say – Are you doing it for your own personal benefit? May be people will say you are undemocratic? May be people will say you are just a student? How come a student talk of heading Indian Translators Association when thousands of them are fit to be your teacher?

I kept on wondering on above thoughts, suggestions, warning etc. At one point of time I was forced to think, India may not have a Translators Association at all. At that phase of time, I was forced to analyze the main reasons behind failure of Indian Translators to create one association. They can be summed up as;

1. Translation activities have been treated as very personal and private affair of individual language professionals. Many times even best friends do not share information between themselves about their translation projects!

2. Translators suffer from identity crisis - Let us say, an Indian language professional refers to himself as a translator in a gathering of friends or acquaintances who otherwise have no other association with the translation industry. The response the professional's statement would commonly receive would simply be, "Okay, this is what you do. But what is your profession?" This underlines a very simple fact that the translation industry generally has very little professional recognition in the perception of the masses. This does affect the credibility and the position of a professional translation in the eyes of his peers in society. This is what we translators refer to as an Identity Crisis. (For more details one may like to visit the site of Microsoft-India where my interview with Bhashaindia
(Indian languages promotion site of Microsoft) appears at (http://www.bhashaindia.com/Patrons/SuccessStories/RaviKumar.aspx

3. Ego clashes - identity crisis makes an individual more sensitive to issues that have been making him suffer, any new initiative is looked at with suspicion - once suspicion comes - questions are asked, many times resulting in absurd questions offending egos.

4. If at all logic prevails - the established translators start fearing loosing their business which they have established since years making personal efforts - but very privately. Under no circumstances
they want to come to a platform and discuss relations or issues related to their clients. But this thought is not expressed directly (part of identity crisis), rather it is expressed in terms of pin- pointing personal or professional or organizational weaknesses of the individual who has taken initiative! Come on, no one is perfect! and you can expect perfection from others only when you prove that you are part of his / her initiatives ! Or else ego clashes again - part of another identity crisis. But established translators or critics fail to come forward and initiatives are weakened.

In due course of time, when I gained more experience fit to be called as established translator - I again approached many established translators to create a platform. This time students were more enthusiastic and supportive, but established translators started seeing me not as a student rather a competitor! So this time it was neither ego, nor identity crisis rather competition - a direct clash of business interests. However, a few of them gave encouragement that could not motivate me much. It is also interesting to note that agencies wanted to help me and cooperated a lot. This was a good sign.

Time passed by, I gained more experience to become Visiting Professor and language and culture trainer (I am happy that till date I have trained more than 400 business executives and MBA students of top 10
MBA institutes of India - I am sorry if I appear to be boosting of myself). It was the same time when I re-launched my own agency (www.modlingua.com) Allied Modlingua for bigger projects, and attract clients from abroad. I am happy that we have also diversified into CAT tools business by being exclusive distributor of CAT tool in India called Heartsome (more details available at www.heartsome.net) a well known CAT tool maker from Singapore.

My dream of ITA formation was still alive. But I always wanted to avoid criticism and leg pulling. Probably, many like minded individuals, agencies and corporate were watching my activities. On one historical day like minded group of individuals coming from various corners of India decided to gather at one place to create a forum called Translators Initiative ( www.translatorsinitiative.org) and gave me responsibility of being its Convenor. For this I extend special thanks to Patron of ITA Dr. S.K Ray and Vice- President of ITA Mr. C.M Rawal and all other founder members. The main aim of this forum was to stimulate language professionals, translators and agencies to join hands to create Indian Translators Association. With efforts of this forum a mega Indian Translators Meet was organized in September, 2005.
Translators Initiative had set three specific objectives. One was to create awareness about Translators Initiative and its aims and objectives. Second was to stimulate language professionals to come together to be a part of the planning behind the proposed Indian Translators Association. The third objective was to identify leaders and volunteers who would join hands in the formation of the Association for future activities.

A complete report on Indian Translation Meet 2005 finds its proud place in leading portals as well as at the site of Microsoft India

http://www.translatorscafe.com/cafe/News.asp?Mode=Full&NewsID=70
http://www.bhashaindia.com/Patrons/events/TranslatorsMeetReport.aspx
http://www.bhashaindia.com/Patrons/events/TranslatorsMeet.aspx
http://www.bhashaindia.com/Patrons/events/TranslatorsMeetIssues.aspx
http://www.bhashaindia.com/Patrons/events/ForgingRelationships.aspx

After the Indian Translators Meet 2005 was over, a draft proposal for formation of Indian Translators Association was put in circulation to receive comments and suggestions from various corners of India so as to incorporate the best feasible options in the constitution and bylaws of the ITA. After having given ample time, quite a few sessions were called for deliberations and discussions in which a large number of translators and scholars participated and reached at fruitful conclusions. Finally, 17 founder members volunteered with their resources and time to be part of Indian Translators Association, which received formal approval from competent government authorities of India as well as registration certificate from registrar of societies, dated December 19, 2006.

The ITA bylaws - fundamental details are available at the site of ITA INDIA : www.itaindia.org
A discussion group has also been started at http://groups.google.com/group/itaindia to receive suggestions and incorporate feasible changes and bring improvement in the existing bylaws keeping into account that we have very limited resources ( only USD 3000/- yearly budget voluntary contribution by all 17 founder members) and enormous challenges from within and from outside.

For feedbacks and comments always write to: info@itaindia.org

Ravi Kumar
Founder President
Indian Translators Association
K-5/B, Lower Ground Floor, Kalkaji,
New Delhi, India
Tel : 0091-11-26291676
Fax: 0091-11-41675530
E-mail: ravi@modlingua.com