When you grab a bottle of shampoo in the morning, you are unconsciously saying a Hindi word. Nearly two centuries before it became a common bathroom fixture worldwide, the word 'champo' meant massaging and rubbing the scalp with oil.
On September 14th, India celebrates Hindi Diwas—the day the Constituent Assembly adopted Hindi in Devanagari script as an official language in 1949. This is a fitting moment to note something rarely taught in schools: hundreds of everyday English words used from London to Los Angeles were borrowed from Hindi.
Words that came through trade and travel
The word 'shampoo,' meaning to wash hair, originates from 'champi,' which means head massage. Seth Din Mohammed, born in Patna in 1759, later opened the 'Hindoostane Coffee House' in London, which became Britain's first Indian restaurant. In 1814, he opened a spa complex in Brighton offering this massage, and the word spread along with the service, later transforming into a liquid product.
The word 'bungalow,' meaning a single-story house, traces back to the word 'bangla,' which translates to 'in the Bengali style.' British colonial officials fully adopted both the word and the architectural style, and it is now used to describe any low, detached house in the English-speaking world.
'Jungle,' meaning a dense, tangled forest, has roots in the Sanskrit-Hindi word 'jangal,' which originally denoted barren or unpopulated land, not trees. The meaning only changed after British foresters began using it to describe thick, overgrown vegetation.
'Pyjamas,' referring to loose home clothing for sleeping, directly derives from drawstring trousers worn for centuries in South Asia. Residents of Britain in colonial India adopted them for home comfort and brought the word back to England in the nineteenth century.
The word 'cot,' meaning a light portable bed, comes from 'khat'—a simple woven frame found in Indian homes, traditionally stretched with jute or cotton rope over a wooden frame.
'Chutney,' a spicy fruit or vegetable sauce, originates from 'chatni,' which means to lick or rub. The British exported jarred versions to Australia and North America in the nineteenth century, permanently cementing the word in English cuisines.
Words with a darker history
'Juggernaut,' meaning unstoppable force, comes from the name Jagannath, which is a name for Vishnu worshipped at the Jagannath Temple in Puri, Odisha. There, devotees annually pull massive wooden chariots through the streets during the Rath Yatra in Puri. Early British travelers, mistakenly interpreting festival accidents as ritual sacrifice, transformed the deity's name into this English word.
The word 'loot,' meaning stolen property or robbery, entered the English language from the Hindi 'lut,' which means to rob. This word was used only in a limited capacity outside northern India until the eighteenth century, when it infiltrated through military reports of the colonial administration.
'Thug,' meaning a violent criminal, derives from 'thag,' which means swindler. Initially, it described organized gangs that robbed travelers across colonial India before the word acquired its modern meaning.
The word 'cushy,' meaning easy or comfortable, comes from 'khushi,' which means happiness. It entered the slang of the British Army during World War I to describe a safe and effortless place of service.
Linguists have tracked this exchange for over a century. The Oxford English Dictionary already contained about 900 words recognized as distinctive to Indian English, and its editors continue to add new ones every year, including recent entries like 'jugaad,' 'dadagiri,' and 'chai.'
Danika Salazar, editor of the OED's World English, noted that four centuries of shared history between Britain and India have left a legacy of borrowed words that have significantly enriched the English vocabulary, and this process continues today, not just belonging to the colonial past.
Thus, Hindi Diwas invites people to notice something more. Language does not move in one direction, and English, often considered the giver of borrowings, has actually been quietly borrowing throughout the centuries.
Every time someone showers with shampoo, calls a company a 'juggernaut,' or complains about 'cushy' work, they are using words formed on Indian streets, in temples, and in spa complexes long before they entered the dictionary.
