Do you know where the word ‘Chowkidar’ came from?

NEW DELHI: Ahead of the coming Lok Sabha polls, “Chowkidar Chor Hai (watchman is a thief)” and “Main Bhi Chowkidar (I am a watchman too)” are the only two slogans you were listening everywhere.

And the word ‘Chowkidar’ has now taken on a political meaning after Prime Minister Narendra Modi calls himself a responsible Chowkidar and even prefixed the word ‘chowkidar’ in the title of his Twitter account to “Chowkidar Narendra Modi.”

But do you know where the word ‘Chowkidar’ came from?

The word is derived from the Urdu word. The Urdu word ‘chowk’ means (outpost or toll house) and dar means (keeper) together make up the word Chowkidar, which has even made it to the Oxford dictionary.

[also_read url=”https://www.siasat.com/news/modi-launches-main-bhi-chowkidar-campaign-1477911/”]Modi launches ‘Main Bhi Chowkidar’ campaign[/also_read]

Attempting to counters Congress President Rahul Gandhi’s repeated attacks with the slogan – “Chowkidar Chor Hai (watchman is a thief)” Modi on Sunday launched the ‘Main Bhi Chowkidar’ campaign.

Soon, several party bigwigs and ministers also followed suit and prefixed their Twitter handle names with the word ‘Chowkidar’ (watchman).

Since then, at least 20 lakh people came out to support the “Main Bhi Chowkidar” campaign and tweeted on their accounts with hashtag ‘MainBhiChowkidar and are a proud to be a Twitter Chowkidar.