The Problem of Urdu

[RangerPK]

Once the language is the same, the culture become the same; once the culture is the same the ideas become the same; once the ideas become the same the borders mean nothing; once the borders mean nothing, the borders come down; once the borders come down, the demographics become the same; once the demographics become the same, the economics become the same; once the economics become the same the political thinking becomes the same; once the political thinking become the same, the identity becomes the same; once the identity becomes the same… there is no more Pakistan, there is only India.
We’ll be back to living under the nightmare that was the Maratha and Sikh rule of the 1700-1800s.

I think the above paragraph shows the insecurity of some Pakistanis.. They don't seem themself convinced they are two separate nation from the Indian states, thus they constantly need to prove themselves to be different from Indians, by coming up with such arguments...

National language of Pakistan is Urdu, because it keeps the nation held together...

almost everyone on the Internet speaks English, take this forum for example, does that make us all lose our "identity" some how. When Arabs and Iranians speak English do they automatically lose their identity and become culturally unified?

I highly doubt that....

Tough I won't mind if Urdu is replaced by English. We seem to be half way there anyways....

 

[jatt+gutts]

Once the language is the same, the culture become the same; once the culture is the same the ideas become the same; once the ideas become the same the borders mean nothing; once the borders mean nothing, the borders come down; once the borders come down, the demographics become the same; once the demographics become the same, the economics become the same; once the economics become the same the political thinking becomes the same; once the political thinking become the same, the identity becomes the same; once the identity becomes the same… there is no more Pakistan, there is only India.
We’ll be back to living under the nightmare that was the Maratha and Sikh rule of the 1700-1800s.

I think the above paragraph shows the insecurity of some Pakistanis.. They don't seem themself convinced they are two separate nation from the Indian states, thus they constantly need to prove themselves to be different from Indians, by coming up with such arguments...

National language of Pakistan is Urdu, because it keeps the nation held together...

almost everyone on the Internet speaks English, take this forum for example, does that make us all lose our "identity" some how. When Arabs and Iranians speak English do they automatically lose their identity and become culturally unified?

I highly doubt that....

Tough I won't mind if Urdu is replaced by English. We seem to be half way there anyways....

wasnt maratha and sikh rule better than taliban who are ruling your country now a days

 

[RangerPK]

If you think those low budget unpopular indian cartoons some how are a "threat" to our culture and fragile "identity" what about American cartoons which have been airing on our tv channels for decades now. Almost everyone grew up on them, and now they air 24/7...

Has this made us into Western Americans?

 

[FaujHistorian]

Hindi itself is getting punjabified and hindi aint gonna dominate in indian punjab i can assure you that and neither do in other provinces of india.. there are lot of dramas and movies in regional languages too in india.

Yeap.

Hindi/Urdu are evolving at a local level (subcontinent being local)

just like

English is evolving and dominating at global level.

 

[jatt+gutts]

Yeap.

Hindi/Urdu are evolving at a local level (subcontinent being local)

just like

English is evolving and dominating at global level.

then they will become punjabi dialects.

 

[takeiteasy]

...or is that article a "attention seeker" from Indians? who will want to care for audience in another country that too enemy? malayasians also watches hindi serials and their eeman is still strong and better than most pakistanis. so..

 

[Armstrong]

without exception such..........around through our own doings, not the help or saazish of outsiders.

I'm not entirely sure that I'd want Arabic as our common tongue (lingua franca), I'm sure learning Classical Arabic - its Grammar, Literature etc. would more than suffice as it did for most of our ancestors ! After all Iqbal's mother tongue was neither Arabic nor Persian but he has mastery over both as did many educated Muslims in those times - I say we revisit that !

Plus as a student of Iqbal, of Rummi & Shams amongst others - I hope that we can savior the works of these poets of unparalleled brilliance in the original tongue !

 

[RangerPK]

^ nopes lahore is fine for you guys.. but writing urdu is very complicated stuff. punjabi is your local language and learning it in gurumukhi script will not b problem...other than kuran letter are in arabic script... i once tried to learn urdu from a pakistani friend and found hindi/punjabi is way too easy.

I think Urdu can be a bit difficult to read, because vowels like (zir, zaber, peish) are not usually written. the focus is mainly on writting consonants.

So in a way you read the word not because how it is written, but because you are familiar with it.

In English, both vowels and consonants are written, thus it's actually quite easier to pick up, because you can write words fanatically, much easily.

I see, Urdu being written with English alphabets a lot these days, on the Internet on mobile phone, SMS. Etc.
even by people who are not well educated.

 

[ShahidT]

I'm not entirely sure that I'd want Arabic as our common tongue (lingua franca), I'm sure learning Classical Arabic - its Grammar, Literature etc. would more than suffice as it did for most of our ancestors ! After all Iqbal's mother tongue was neither Arabic nor Persian but he has mastery over both as did many educated Muslims in those times - I say we revisit that !

Plus as a student of Iqbal, of Rummi & Shams amongst others - I hope that we can savior the works of these poets of unparalleled brilliance in the original tongue !

you know sometimes I wonder. our elders were wise people, and built this country from scratch when it was thrown onto their hands. yet we still question so many basic things and the way we are. personally, I wouldn't consider our generation to even have half the prudence or wisdom of our forefathers, yet all we do is complain. seems to me the fault lies more with us than our country.

Anyways, thanks for the insights as always Butt saahb

 

[FaujHistorian]

then they will become punjabi dialects.

Hindi/Urdu indeed is a variation of Punjabi.

This is why Lahore has been one of the premier centers of Urdu in addtion to Delhi and Lakhnow.

peace

 

[Mian H Amin.]

 

[Mian H Amin.]

i do agree with what you said.

 

[FaujHistorian]

wasnt maratha and sikh rule better than taliban who are ruling your country now a days

Jatt sahib,

Do visit Pakistan sometimes.

You will see that Punjabis rule Pakistan with minor parts played by Urdu speaking Mohajirs from Karachi and Pashtun from Peshawar+ Charsada.

TTP / Talib mofos are in the tribal belt mainly. They were active in the same tribal belt even during Maharaja Ranjit Singh time.



As far as Sikh rule is concerned.


Well, complain it to the Akali and other Sikh leaders of 1940s. they had a chance to rule Pakistan too.

but they got roped into Congress schemes and thus lost their holy province and holy lands. Once in East Punjab, the same Congress tore apart Punjab even further. And now the little Punjab has not even been given their own state capital. Shameful isn't it?

This was the biggest travesty of the Sikh leadership against their own people, their own homeland.

There were exceptions like Giyani Kartar Singh.But such nationalist leaders were successfully sidelined by the pro-congress sikhs or the militant sikh leaders like Master Tara Singh.

I'll reserve comments about maratha rule for another time. But I do not expect a true Punjabi and especially a Sikh Jatt to be glorifying marathas.

peace

 

[FaujHistorian]

you know sometimes I wonder. our elders were wise people,:

yes Siree.

Our ancestors were the likes of Sir Syed Ahmad Khan. Who were the champions of English language even 150 years ago. They didn't care about nationalist mumbo jumbo. They just wanted to make sure Muslims in the subcontinent get good education and become mainstream.

We on the other hand got into this Urdu business right after 1947 mainly thanks to the false propaganda of my own community.

We made mistake by imposing foreign tongue aka urdu on the people of Sindh, Balochistan, and Bengal, with pretty bad results.

But we still fail to realize the destructive nature of imposing a language on people.

peace

 

[Huda]

make standard punjabi( dialect of amritsar) your national language..and use gurumukhi script it is much easier than urdu script..you guys can learn it in 1 hour

In punjabi