Make no bones about it..

Congress leaders make no bones about their desire to make Rahul Gandhi, the PM off India

Our new placement coordinator is an ex-army Colonel. He made no bones about the fact that till we possess excellent spoken English skills, we will have a lot of difficulty in finding good jobs.

Make no bones about it – that’s our target phrase for this post.

It means saying something as clearly as possible – without any sugar coating, without any efforts to make it sound less unpleasant than it really is. Saying it as it is – that’s what making no bones means.

Let’s see some examples:

1. Arvind Kejriwal made no bones about the fact that there were serious criminal charges against several elected representatives and that winning election cannot be a ticket to escape punishment or an unchecked license to loot.
2. the new coach made no bones about the fact that the team performance was bad and they needed to get more disciplined.
3. The PM made no bones about the bad shape the economy was in and the need for hard steps.
4. The Indian foreign minister made no bones about the involvement of Pakistan army and ISI in terrorist attacks across India.

Use this phrase when you want to express the act of saying something in plain words without being bothered about offending someone or giving someone false assurance.

Let’s see some more examples:

1. The doctor made no bones about his bad health and damage his drinking habit was doing to him. “If you keep on drinking like this, you will be a dead man in less than a year”, he said.
2. I like the new company president. He made no bones about the mistakes made by the management and appeared sincere. I hope the company does well under him.
3. Mulayam Singh made no bones about his dream to become the prime minister of India.
4. The speaker made no bones about the weaknesses of our education system. We should be proud of what we are but we should not hide its weaknesses. Otherwise we are being stupid.