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Madras Bashai (Tamil:மெட்ராஸ் பாஷை,lit. 'Madras Language') is avariety of theTamil language spoken by native people in the city ofChennai (previously known as Madras) in theIndian state ofTamil Nadu.^[1] In the past it was sometimes considered apidgin, as its vocabulary was heavily influenced byHindustani,Indian English,Telugu,Malayalam, andBurmese; it is not mutually intelligible with any of those except for Tamil, to a certain extent.

Since the advent of urbanization of the city especially since theIndian Independence, due to large migrations into the city from different parts ofTamil Nadu, the Madras Bashai variety has become closer to normalized standard spoken Tamil. Today, the transformed variety is mainly referred to asChennai Tamil.

Madras Bashai evolved largely during the past three centuries. It grew in parallel with the growth of cosmopolitan Madras. After Madras Bashai became somewhat common in Madras, it became a source ofsatire for earlyTamil films from the 1950s, in the form ofpuns anddouble entendres. Subsequent generations inChennai identified with it and absorbed English constructs into the dialect, making it what it is today's Chennai Tamil.

The wordMadras Bashai is a compound term, whereMadrās is derived from the classical name of the cityMadrāsapaṭnam, andbhāṣā is theSanskrit word for "language", nativized tobāṣai.

Madras Bashai evolved largely during the past three centuries. With its emergence as an important city inBritish India when they recovered it from theFrench and as the capital ofMadras Presidency, the contact with western world increased and a number of English words crept into the vocabulary. Many of these words were introduced by educated, middle-class Tamil migrants to the city who borrowed freely from English for their daily usage.^[2] Due to the presence of a considerable population of Telugu, Hindi–Urdu and many other language-speakers, especially, theGujaratis,Marwaris and someMuslim communities, some Hindustani and Telugu words, too, became a part of Madras Bashai. At the turn of the 20th century, though preferences have since shifted in favor of the Central and Madurai Tamil dialects, the English words introduced during the early 20th century have been retained.^[2]

Madras Bashai is generally considered a dialect of theworking class like theCockney dialect of English. Lyrics ofgaana songs make heavy use of Madras Bashai.

A few words unique to Madras Bashai are given below; an Internet project, urban Tamil, has set out to collect urban Tamil vocabulary.

Words borrowed from other languages

Madras Bashai is used in manyTamil movies after the 1950s. Actors such,Manorama,J. P. Chandrababu,Loose Mohan,Thengai Srinivasan,Surulirajan,Janagaraj,Cho Ramaswamy,Rajinikanth,Kamal Haasan,Vijay Sethupathi,Dhanush,Suriya,Santhanam,Vikram,Attakathi Dinesh,Vijay andAjith Kumar are well known for using it. Many screenwriters such asCrazy Mohan are known for frequently incorporating puns using the Madras Bashai into movie dialogue. Representative films areMaharasan,Bommalattam,Sattam En Kaiyil,Thoongathey Thambi Thoongathey,Michael Madana Kama Rajan,Thirumalai,Vasool Raja MBBS,Attahasam,Pammal K. Sambandam,Chennai 600028,Siva Manasula Sakthi,Theeradha Vilaiyattu Pillai,Saguni,Attakathi,Theeya Velai Seiyyanum Kumaru,Idharkuthane Aasaipattai Balakumara,I,Madras,Kasethan Kadavulada,Anegan,Vedalam,Maari,Maari 2,Aaru,Sketch,Vada Chennai,Ghilli, andBigil,Avvai Shanmugi ,Dipavali^[6]

• Chennai Slang - List of words

• Madrassi
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• Indian slang

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