sarkar

See also: Sarkar

English

Alternative forms

• sirkar, sircar, circar

Etymology

From Hindi सरकार (sarkār)/Urdu سرکار (sarkār), from Persian سرکار (sarkâr, “superintendent, overseer, chief”), compound of سر (sar, “head”) + کار (kâr, “agent, doer”).

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈsɜːkɑː/
• (India) IPA^(key): /səɹkaːɹ/

Noun

sarkar (plural sarkars) (India)

1. (historical) An administrative unit used mostly in the Muslim states of South Asia.
2. A Hindu clerk or accountant.
   • 1845, Joachim Hayward Stocqueler, The Hand-book of India, page 219:

     […] and there would be various objections to trusting a native with the purport of such communications, even where some of the baboos, sircars, purvoes, and others of that genus, can converse with sufficient comprehensiveness in English […]

3. A native steward or housekeeper.
4. The Government, the State.
   • 1888, Rudyard Kipling, “In the House of Suddhoo”, in Plain Tales from the Hills, Folio, published 2005, page 99:

     He said that Janoo had told him that there was an order of the Sirkar against magic, because it was feared that magic might one day kill the Empress of India.

5. Administration of a particular prime minister.
   • 2017, Taachal, What after Modi Sarkar?:

     No doubt, a handful of people are immensely benefiting from the policies of the Modi Sarkar.

Anagrams

• arkars, kraars

Part or all of this entry has been imported from the 1913 edition of Webster’s Dictionary, which is now free of copyright and hence in the public domain. The imported definitions may be significantly out of date, and any more recent senses may be completely missing.
(See the entry for “sarkar”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.)