The other day a friend of mine asked me to join her for pot luck. Maintaining, as she does, an excellent table and being at a loose end that evening, I accepted with alacrity, prepared to enjoy what I knew would be a delectable dinner. However, it soon transpired that the invitation was not for that evening at all but for the following week! What my would-be hostess meant by pot luck was a simple and informal meal and not a spontaneous offer of what was already in the pot.

I was to be disappointed that evening but the error is a common one ? if it can be considered an error at all in this country. We all speak Indian English, a language that has evolved through absorbing our own nuances and interpretations.

There are other invitations that can also be misunderstood but rarely are. Free board for an indeterminate time is not what is being offered when someone in the South invites you to come and have your meals with him. ?Come and take your meals with me,? he might say, but you can be sure that he is referring to just lunch or dinner! Even signboards on hotels will proclaim that meals are ready, though only one meal is expected to be consumed. Indeed, ‘meals’ might even include breakfast, ‘break’ universally pronounced to rhyme with ‘brake’.

And what about tiffin, that uniquely Indian meal? And from where did it come? Hobson Jobson, that bible of Anglo-Indian English, tells us that members of English households in India were known to tiff, or take luncheon. Some others believe that the word came from the Arabic tafannun which means amusement or diversion while still others attribute the root to the Chinese ch’ih-fan or eat-rice. Most likely, however, is the belief that the word is derived from an old English slang term that describes tiffing as eating or drinking out of meal times, which is exactly the meaning we attribute to it.

But whatever the origin of this word may be, tiffin is here to stay and has even begun to sprout variations on the theme. I remember a fair in Calcutta some years ago where a stall was doing brisk business. The name on its door, in large letters, was ‘Breakfast at Tiffany’s’.

Those less conversant with India might have imagined that what was being offered was a private showing of the famous film. But there was no doubt in the minds of the crowds that the stall sold nothing other than tiffin!

So what’s in a word? Whether it is tiffin, or pot luck, or meals in the plural when only the singular is meant, or, for that matter, any number of other words in the Indian English lexicon, there are not many of us who would not understand exactly what they stand for, which, after all, is all that matters.