On January 2, when senior Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) leader Acharya Giriraj Kishore hit out at Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee describing him as a 'pseudo-Hindu', it signified a turning point in a raging debate that has the taken the nation in its grips.

Being attributed the "pseudo" tag to derogate is not a new phenomenon. The term entered the political lexicon about a decade ago and its many users now have pencilled in the word in any copies of dictionaries that they could lay their hands on.

It is not unusual to walk into Higginbothams, a book store in New Delhi and find a leather-bound copy of the Chambers dictionary with the word inserted, in almost illegible, red ink amidst the black typeset.

In a curious coming around of what goes around, the Deputy Prime Minister L K Advani, who first used the term on those who did not share his opinions was himself called pseudo-secular not too long ago after some of his expressions in the Parliament. Vajpayee has been at the brunt of the verbal attack since he attended 'Iftar' hosted by the Civil Aviation Minister Shahnawaz Hussein.

The Muslim custom 'Iftar' is the breaking of the daily fast during the month of Ramadan. The current charge by the Acharya emanated, however, when the PM apparently spoke about the 'hindutva' movement in an address from Goa where he was vacationing.

The rapid use of the term and its political implications, not to mention its literary precedents has forced Osmania University to institute a Department of Pseudology (DoP). Dr Shridhar Khatri has been appointed as the chief pseudologist. Dr Khatri comes in with his 20 years experience as a private, small animals physiotherapist.

A search is on by a steering committee led by Dr Khatri to acquire all literature with the term 'pseudo' in the title. The search has already brought in books as varied as "Pseudo-random coding techniques for high speed communications" and "Pseudo-Macarius: The 50 spiritual homilies and the great letter (classics of Western spirituality)".

Being a new field, the current free users of the expression were contacted to comment. The Acharya from VHP was unavailable, but his spokesman Mondkar was eager with explanation. "If you are a Hindu and attended 'Iftar', then you are a pseudo- Hindu. But if you are secular and attended 'Iftar' then you are pseudo-secular," he said. If you were Hindu and secular and attended 'Iftar', then you became a pseudo- secular-Hindu. He went on to shorten the double hyphenation and called them "pseudo- secuindoo".

By analogy, a secular Muslim that went to 'Iftar' would be 'pseudo-seculim'. Mondkar was ready with responses to various questions on how the 'pseudo' label gets attached. For example, he said, "If you were a pregnant-Kashmiri and attended 'Iftar', then you were pseudo-pregnant."

Khatri, chief pseudologist at the DoP said Mondkar of the VHP was simplifying the pseudo-concepts. He said in certain cases this was related to attending 'Iftar' but the matter was not quite as trivial. He said there was a big identity crisis amongst Indians today. Many of them did not know for sure if they were real or 'pseudo'. He went as far as to say that India's population was only 50 crore. The other 50 crore did not exist as they were all 'pseudos'.

The usage has not been very negative in all circles. Mullah Shabir of the Karimnagar Masjid has requested the VHP to call him 'pseudo'-something. He said it sounded very good. The Mullah, who is a former weaver said he was on the look out for a nice English-sounding title. He didn't care what it meant.

In the Southern state of Tamil Nadu (TN), pseudo-secularism has taken a different meaning altogether. Advani's old slur was misunderstood by the many parochial parties with atheistic origins. 'Pseud' was mistakenly used by Aramugham of the Dravida Pride Party (DPP), to refer to a phonetically similar word meaning hot in Tamil. Since then it has been used to refer to the heated fervour with which partymen have been practising secularism. According to him, it is better to be a pseudo-secularist, a hot secularist, than a 'jill'-secularist. 'Jill' is a commonly used term in Tamil to mean cold or frozen.

Aramugham said his party believed in worshipping actors and actresses equally, irrespective of their cine-idol's faith, making them pseudo-secular.

The popularity of the 'pseudo' usage was evident with Tamil Nadu's Chief Minister Jayalalithaa, naming her recently adopted daughter Pseudamani. "After all, what will I do with all my assets," she said, referring to her vast wealth.

Her earlier adoptee, a son, now disowned had cost her a lot of money in wedding expenses. "I have something to look forward to in the wedding of Pseudamani," Jayalalithaa said at the time of the adoption.

Besides the political and etymological concerns associated with the usage, there have been lexical concerns too. Due to the frugal use of consonants in the Tamil language, the "Real Tamil Club", a non-profit organisation in TN that promotes the use of Tamil in the state has decided that they will drop the letter 'P' in front of 'pseudo' as they think it is confusing their members and making transliterator's jobs complicated.

Hindi speaking members were also finding it difficult to use the shortened 'pa' and 'sa' consonants in the beginning of a word. Pandit Vishwanath of the 'Prakrithik Bhasha Adyayan Kendra', has recommended the use of the sound 'ae' to precede the word 'pseudo'. He said 'epsuedo' is easier to use with the local languages.

Meanwhile, the Prime Minister's office when contacted about Vajpayee attending 'Iftar', gave a curt written response. The PM was hungry, and besides, the biryani was good, the statement said.