Pakistan name should be changed

[asad71]

guys can we for the sake of pakistan stop this crap that the pashtoons of pakistan are afghan first or pakistani first? are you kidding me? dont you know who we are if we are living in pakistan? we are pakistanies since 14 august 1947 and if u dont know that before and you just a day ago through social media realize that ahh pushtoons on this side are shouting that we are pakistanis you need to get some education. change the name my foot.

Some are even calling to rename Afghanistan into Khorasan.

 

[CHD]

In response to Torkham issue , a social media battle has been erupted between Afghan-Pashtuns and Pakistani Pashtuns, they are calling names to countries of each other. Pakistani Pashtuns, majority of them, are saying that they are not Afghans and refuse to be called Afghans. While Pashtun nationalists of Pakistan, smaller in number, are insisting that they are Afghans and will always be Afghans.

I am asking a very simple and innocent question from all Pakistanis........if Pashtun is not Afghan then dont you think Pakistan should be renamed as "A" in Pakistan word stands for 'Afghania'.

Well we plan to capture whole afgainistan in future so that was decided in advance

 

[Sage]

What a dumb-*** thread ....MoD ...shut it down plz ...!

 

[Deidara]

The letters in Pakistan don't really stand for the different regions. Pakistan simply means pure land or land of the pure. Just like Uzbekistan means land of Uzbeks, Tajikistan means land of Tajiks. That's what the names of all -stan countries mean.

 

[Zibago]

Ham na rahein hamarey baad Pak sar zamin shad bad

 

[Indus Pakistan]

In response to Torkham issue , a social media battle has been erupted between Afghan-Pashtuns and Pakistani Pashtuns, they are calling names to countries of each other. Pakistani Pashtuns, majority of them, are saying that they are not Afghans and refuse to be called Afghans. While Pashtun nationalists of Pakistan, smaller in number, are insisting that they are Afghans and will always be Afghans.

I am asking a very simple and innocent question from all Pakistanis........if Pashtun is not Afghan then dont you think Pakistan should be renamed as "A" in Pakistan word stands for 'Afghania'.

Yes, your right that "A" in Pakistan stood for Afghania. Rehmat Ali coined the name after Sir Allama Iqbal's speech of 1930.

India is a continent of human groups belonging to different races, speaking different languages, and professing different religions [...] Personally, I would like to see the Punjab, North-West Frontier Province, Sindh and Baluchistan amalgamated into a single State. Self-government within the British Empire, or without the British Empire, the formation of a consolidated North-West Indian Muslim State appears to me to be the final destiny of the Muslims, at least of North-West India.

Link > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allahabad_Address

I am enclosing herewith an appeal on behalf of the thirty million Muslims of PAKISTAN, who live in the five Northern Units of India--Punjab, North-West Frontier (Afghan) Province, Kashmir, Sind, and Baluchistan. It embodies their demand for the recognition of their national status, as distinct from the other inhabitants of India, by the grant to Pakistan of a separate Federal Constitution on religious, social and historical grounds.

Link > http://www.columbia.edu/itc/mealac/pritchett/00islamlinks/txt_rahmatali_1933.html

So yes your correct in that the "a" in Pakistan is culled from Afghana. Now with regards to the point you raise it is not as straight forward as you frame it. The question you need to first address is what does the name "Afghan" mean in 2016? Words, geographic names and language is in constant state of flux. Meanings change over time. This is known as linguistic drift.

Link > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drift_(linguistics)

Does "Afghan" mean Pashtun in 2016 as understood in general sense? If "Afghan" does mean and is a synonym of Pashtun in 2016 that raises two interesting points.

(i) That "Afghan" is one side of the coin with the other side being "Pashtun". This being so the term "Afghan" would be termed as a ethnic definition of population group living in Pakistan and Afghanistan speaking Pashto. By this definition both Pashtuns on both sides of the border are "Afghan".

However if the above point is taken as fact then another point follows from the above.

(ii) That "Afghan" is a ethnic term exclusively and only referring to Pashto speakers. This then excludes other ethnic groups like Tajiks, Uzbek, Mongol Hazara, Turkmen in Afghanistan.

I have had this debate with many Afghans and many play intellectual cheats. On one hand they claim "Afghan" is a ethnic term (which of course excludes Tajiks, Mongol Hazara, Uzbek or Turkmen) and on the other use it as a political catch all term for every ethnic group in Afghanistan. Well you can't have it both ways. You can't have your cake and eat it (too)

So to answer your point in 2016 if the term "Afghan" is at the normative taken to mean all the ethnic groups in Afghanistan - Pashtun, Tajik, Mongol Hazara, Uzbek, Turkmen it follows Pak Pashtun are outside of that definition. The "a" in Pakistan has become redundant today however that does not mean we change the name even if the province is now called K-P. Let it be just a historical footnote today.

However this issue has become something of stick for Afghans to beat Pakistan with. The oft repeated claim is Pak Pashtun's are sell outs and sit around a table with Punjabi, Sindhi and Baloch. They of course ignore that the Afghan Pashtun sit around a table with Mongol Hazara, Persian Tajiks, Turkic Turkmen and Uzbeks. Afghanistan is multi ethnic state like Pakistan is. Like most countries in this region from Turkey, Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan to India.

The original pamphlet "Now or Never" from 1933. Link > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pakistan_Declaration

 

[Solomon2]

You can't give up the name, "Pakistan". Under the terms of the 1963 Sino-Pakistan agreement the boundary between China and Pakistan exists only as long as Pakistan does so once Pakistan disappears, China can then lay claim to everything from Kashmir to Karachi. (The European analogy is that Pakistan is China's duchy which exists only as long as its ruling house; if that fails, the surrounding or adjacent kingdom has a claim to it.)

 

[Samandri]

Yes, your right that "A" in Pakistan stood for Afghania. Rehmat Ali coined the name after Sir Allama Iqbal's speech of 1930.

India is a continent of human groups belonging to different races, speaking different languages, and professing different religions [...] Personally, I would like to see the Punjab, North-West Frontier Province, Sindh and Baluchistan amalgamated into a single State. Self-government within the British Empire, or without the British Empire, the formation of a consolidated North-West Indian Muslim State appears to me to be the final destiny of the Muslims, at least of North-West India.

Link > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allahabad_Address

I am enclosing herewith an appeal on behalf of the thirty million Muslims of PAKISTAN, who live in the five Northern Units of India--Punjab, North-West Frontier (Afghan) Province, Kashmir, Sind, and Baluchistan. It embodies their demand for the recognition of their national status, as distinct from the other inhabitants of India, by the grant to Pakistan of a separate Federal Constitution on religious, social and historical grounds.

Link > http://www.columbia.edu/itc/mealac/pritchett/00islamlinks/txt_rahmatali_1933.html

So yes your correct in that the "a" in Pakistan is culled from Afghana. Now with regards to the point you raise it is not as straight forward as you frame it. The question you need to first address is what does the name "Afghan" mean in 2016? Words, geographic names and language is in constant state of flux. Meanings change over time. This is known as linguistic drift.

Does "Afghan" mean Pashtun in 2016 as understood in general sense? If "Afghan" does mean and is a synonym of Pashtun in 2016 that raises two interesting point.

(i) That "Afghan" is one side of the coin with the other side being "Pashtun". This being so the term "Afghan" would be termed as a ethnic definition of population group living in Pakistan and Afghanistan speaking Pashto. By this definition both Pashtuns on both sides of the border are "Afghan".

However if the above point is take as fact then another point follows from the above.

(ii) That "Afghan" is a ethnic term exclusively and only referring to Pashto speakers. This then excludes other ethnic groups like Tajiks, Uzbek, Mongol Hazara, Turkmen in Afghanistan.

I have had this debate with many Afghans and many play intellectual cheats. On one hand they claim "Afghan" is a ethnic term (which of course excludes Tajiks, Mongol Hazara, Uzbek or Turkmen) and on the other use it as a political catch all term for every ethnic group in Afghanistan. Well you can't have it both ways. You can't have your cake and eat it (too)

So to answer your point in 2016 if the term "Afghan" is at the normative taken to mean all the ethnic groups in Afghanistan - Pashtun, Tajik, Mongol Hazara, Uzbek, Turkmen it follows Pak Pashtun are outside of that definition. The "a" in Pakistan has become redundant today however that does not mean we change the name even if the province is now called K-P. Let it be just a historical footnote today.

However this issue has become something of stick for Afghans to beat Pakistan with. The oft repeated claim is Pak Pashtun's are sell outs and sit around a table with Punjabi, Sindhi and Baloch. They of course ignore that the Afghan Pashtun sit around a table with Mongol Hazara, Persian Tajiks, Turkic Turkmen and Uzbeks. Afghanistan is multi ethnic state like Pakistan is. Like most countries in this region from Turkey, Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan to India.

Finally a mature and non-trollish post. You have raised valid questions. The thing is, by discarding Afghan name , we will lose our entire history actually, because our ancestors have always been referred to as Afghan, in almost all of the sources. The modern day Afghanistan came into being in 1747, it has no copy rights over word Afghan just like it has no copy rights over words Pashtun, Pashto and Pashtunwali. Afghans or Pashtuns have imposed their identity on minorities of Afghanistan, which they conquered in the period of Ahmad Shah Abdali. An Uzbek or Tajik or Hazara there is an Afghan by nationality but not by ethnicity.......just like a Pakistani in England is English by nationality but not by ethnicity. If a Pakistani Pashtun say that he is not Afghan by ethnicity, that he discards this word, then he has to cut his ties with big portion of Pashto literature from earliest times.

 

[Strigon]

Threads and the qualities of "intellectuals" these days, keeps pushing me further away from PDF.

 

[Indus Pakistan]

You can't give up the name, "Pakistan".

You can. The name a state chooses to style itself is separate from the legal entity that any given nomenclature defines. All legal obligations are merely carried onto the new name. If Coca Cola decided to change their name to Soca Sola the copyright and assets they hold would continue as it would be the same company only rebranded.

Examples of change of style have been Burma to Myanmar in 1989 or Ceylon to Sri Lanka in early 1970s. The same states continued to exist like I as a biological specimen would continue to exist if I changed my name tomorrow.

discarding Afghan name

I agree. However the problem is today "Afghan" has been appropriated by a political unit called Afghanistan to refer to all it's diverse citizens be they Turkic, Mongol or Persians etc. Therefore one way out of this might be to give it two meanings to the name "Afghan". The political as in present and as historical when talking of preceding centuries.

Thus historical Afghan would equate to ethnic Pashtuns and contemperory Afghans to the multi ethnic groups of the country we call Afghanistan today. This might help to resolve some of the ambigouity created by this naming problem. Just as a addendum I would say most non Pashtuns in Afghanistan would not want Pak Pashtuns to merge with Afghanistan despite the rhetoric for the simple reason that they (Tajiks, Hazara, Turkmen etc) would become tiny minority in a country dominated with Pashtuns. This would lead to even more trouble in that country then they have at the moment. You should check out the treatment meted out by Uzbek warlord General Dostum to Pashtuns in Northern Afghanistan.

 

[Solomon2]

You can. The name a state chooses to style itself is separate from the legal entity that any given nomenclature defines. All legal obligations are merely carried onto the new name. If Coca Cola decided to change their name to Soca Sola the copyright and assets they hold would continue as it would be the same company only rebranded.

Correct in law and theory but remember, we're talking about the Chinese here. At the very least Pakistan would have to get China's written acquiescence to change the name so the China would allow it to retain all the rights it had previously. Otherwise it's the SCS all over again...

 

[livingdead]

The letters in Pakistan don't really stand for the different regions. Pakistan simply means pure land or land of the pure. Just like Uzbekistan means land of Uzbeks, Tajikistan means land of Tajiks. That's what the names of all -stan countries mean.

its probably a backronym...

 

[Indus Pakistan]

its probably a backronym...

Read this (links) below.

Link > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allahabad_Address
Link > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pakistan_Declaration

"Now or Never" pamphlet 1933 by Rehmat Ali

Rehmat Ali (seated first from left) with Sir Allama Iqbal (center), Khawaja Abdul Rahim (right) and a group of other young activists.

 

[livingdead]

Read this (links) below.

Link > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allahabad_Address
Link > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pakistan_Declaration

"Now or Never" pamphlet 1933 by Rehmat Ali

Rehmat Ali (seated first from left) with Sir Allama Iqbal (center), Khawaja Abdul Rahim (right) and a group of other young activists.

ya.. read it already... still think its a backronym... they came up with the name first and then setup letters to fit it...

 

[Indus Pakistan]

ya.. read it already... still think its a backronym... they came up with the name first and then setup letters to fit it... notice the extra 'i' added (for the word to mean something.)

Rehmat Ali specifically stated how he coined the name. He is the original "copyright" holder and explained how P-A-K-S-Tan came from the prefix of the five north west provinces. The "i" was added to smoothen the pronounciation. I have no idea why Indian's refuse to accept this when it is on record the Rehmat Ali came up with this name based on the prefix of the five provinces in 1933 which Sir Allama Iqbal had originally suggested as constituents of future independant state in 1930 Presidential (Allahabad) Address as shown in the link above.

And after all this you without any basis or evidence throw up wild claim of "backronym". Absurd.