Due to religious and cultural differences, he and Ali Nadim, a Pakistani Muslim in the show, hate and confront each other. In his role, he works in the London Underground, and sometimes threatens people with his kirpan (a digger used by Sikhs) hidden under his belt. Ranjeet Singh was most popular among viewers because of his catchphrase “A thousand apologies” apart from his neatly-trimmed black beard and moustache and his Sikh turban. One such very funny character among others in it was Ranjeet Singh, a Sikh from the Punjab region in India. So, each character was etched in viewers’ minds by their fanciful pronunciation and use of English. The program presented an English class which consisted of students from various countries, but didn’t have a good command of English speech. This program was so popular at the time that even though most television viewers in Sri Lanka were Sinhala monolingual, they watched it without fail.
The full episodes of all the seasons can be watched at Side Reel ().If you were a television viewer of Sri Lanka during the late 70s, you will definitely remember a British sitcom titled ‘Mind Your Language’. The Hindi sitcom, Zabaan Sambhalke proved to be extremely popular with Indian audiences.
Mind Your Language has also been the inspiration for various international adaptations.
However, regardless of these beliefs, the show was successfully aired in Australia, Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria and Singapore, among other countries. In 1979, following the end of the third season, Mind Your Language was cancelled by Michael Grade of LWT as he felt that the show's content contained offensive stereotyping.
In addition, Robert Lee, who played Japanese Taro Nagazumi, has since been a frequent figure in numerous British and American TV series. Notable actors playing the roles of the students include Francoise Pascal who starred in There's A Girl In My Soup with Peter Sellers. They represented all walks of life and social backgrounds, from embassy employees to bartenders and au pairs. Students from the school came from China, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, India, Italy, Japan, Pakistan Spain and Sweden. The school's staff are the class teacher Jeremy Brown (Barry Evans), headmistress Ms Dolores Courtney (Zara Nutley), caretaker Sidney (Tommy Godfrey) and dinner lady Gladys (Iris Sadler).
The characters appearing in the Mind Your Language episodes are made up of four staff members of the school plus a host of students, each originating from a different country. The final season was screened on Granada in 1986. In contrast, seasons 3 and 4 incorporate episodes outside of the classroom, including events such as school trips and fetes. Mind Your Language seasons 1 and 2 take place within the classroom and revolve around the students sitting for, failing and retaking exams. With characters representing all corners of the globe, the show was able to touch on the lighter side of cultural differences. The show was directed by Stuart Allen and produced first by LWT (London Weekend Television) and later by Granada Television.
The show draws its humour from the student's comical misunderstandings of the English language, which refer in great part to the cultural stereotypes of each student's nation.
Premièred in 1977 on ITV, Mind You Language focuses on the story of Jeremy Brown, the somewhat unfortunate teacher selected to teach English as a Foreign Language to a mishmash of foreign students living in London. Cultural stereotypes and cultural differences