Bhutan decided to adopt Dzongkha as its national language in 1971. Until then, Dzongkha was spoken mainly by the people in the western part of the country and was referred to as Ngalongkha. Although the language itself has matured in terms of grammar and spellings today, it has largely failed to grow in popularity and usage after almost 5 decades since its adoption as the lingua franca of the kingdom. In my opinion, this is by and large due to the rigidity of its usage enforced by the Dzongkha Development Commission. If it is made a little more fluid and dynamic especially when it comes to writing, the language has the potential to grow and become ubiquitous in the nation.

There are several words used in spoken Dzongkha that are forbidden in text. Words such as ‘Jigs’ and ‘Dha’ which among others are often used informally, are natural words in themselves. If such usages are not allowed in text and therefore don’t find readership, the vernaculars tend to sound pretentious and overtly restrictive. For instance, in place of ‘Jigs’ which might flow naturally, a writer might resort to using the words ‘legshom’. Of course, this usage is not wrong in itself, but the essence of the thought is lost in text when a word is replaced with a substitute.

We might be able to learn a tip or two from how English has evolved over the past few years. The revolution brought forth by the integrated chip has given rise to many terminologies that are not at all in the dictionary. Words such as ‘yeet’ and ‘sus’ are some of the many words that have found their way into the dictionary from world wide web, despite sounding a lot informal.

Yeet is an interjection and a slang that expresses surprise or excited enthusiasm whereas sus directly translates to suspicion. Today, these words are perfectly legal and can be used by anybody in any form of writing. It is therefore crucial that we learn from those that are doing quite well and imitate their actions.

Dzongkha Development Commission (DDC) has so far done a commendable job in ensuring that the language has been adopted by as many people as systemically possible. However, if the process itself is not felt natural, it will lose its grip. Therefore, I would suggest that the DDC take the process a little more leniently and incorporate a greater collection of informal vernaculars and phrases in writing systems, so as to make Dzongkha sound more natural and unenforced.