Urdu is not synonymous with Islam.
Nah. Using farsi didnt make sense. Urdu actually had its speakers whether second language or third language but Persian was a language that never gained tract with the people of the region due to it being high class. Urdu was formed as a union of various languages so that the military campaigns cannot be bottlenecked with language barriers where effective communication can change the very landscape of the battle ground. Persian was entirely the court and the administrative language. It was not the instrument of communication between the local populace. Its status as ?Lingua Franca could also be brought to question that it was the Lingua Franca of the elite and not of the people, which was common for its time however the negative impact of this was that Persian never became the communicative language of the people. It would survive as long as the administration of the multi-ethnic empire survived, but the moment it would decline, so would persian and that is exactly what happened. The moment the
Mughals lost power, the freefall of the Persian Language began and by 1947, it had little to know speakers. To use that as the lingua franca would have been an absolute imposition. Urdu is different in the sense that it was brought forth as a communication device between multi-ethnic soldiery and thus was able to become more rooted amongst the populace than persian and while persian heavily influenced the languages of the empires it was administered in, Urdu was formed from the very languages that were found in the region or were being brought forth. It is not an Indian construct. For example, When guys like saithan, T-12345, Webslave, Blackeyes and all the rest speak in turkic, i am able to understand a few words and that is because Urdu is formed from Turkic as well.
Farsi, by 1947, was going to die. No point trying to spend anytime to save Farsi. Urdu was actually spoken at some quarters as a second or third language in what would go on to become Pakistan. The Punjab of that time had people that spoke it as a second and third language as well and other areas that would have similar cases. Thus Picking Urdu made sense as it was a language understood and spoken already, far more than farsi even in east Pakistan. This was a link and the influence it had from local languages was something that Farsi never had. Urdu was formed from Pashto, Sindhi, Punjabi. If people speak their native language infront of you, you can understand at some low level due to the influence those languages had on urdu.
Coming to creating a new language from Farsi. So another form of Urdu? Why expend the effort to reach the same conclusion and that would have been loved by the populace. Create a new language for a new country and impose it on the people. Not only East Pakistan, West Pakistan would have revolted as well if something like this was done. The Reason people accepted Urdu was due to its links to the region that would become Pakistan. Make a 'Pakvan' and impose it and the country wouldnt have lasted the third day. I have said much about Muslim League and its decisions in Pakistan but language pick was something that i cant criticize. That was a right call.
As for language preservation. I declare openly that we have sinned when it comes to local languages and this should be corrected immediately however Lingua Franca will always be needed due to our diversity. We need that bridge. I am surprised. I thought you would support this language since this is exactly like Pakistan. Urdu is the union of various languages spoken in the neighborhood from Central Asia to the ends of Beas. Pakistan is a union of states from the mountains connecting to Central Asia to the bank of beas. Urdu was basically, before Aurangzeb was called many names three extremely striking, Lahori, Dehalvi and Lashkari. If it was called Lahori then you can imagine the roots it had in modern day Pakistan. Anyhow Lingua Franca was needed and it become Lingua Franca and one that was actually understood by people all over pakistan. Let me give a quote of a local metaphor 'Farsi Zuban Bol raha hai' is a term used back 3-4 generations and to this day to highlight that, i dont understand what you are saying.
Lastly as for Mehmood Achakzai. You ask him to speak Farsi and he will lose his mind. He is a nationalist and he will speak in the tone of Nationalists.
As for India and Languages. I admire what their legal laws did however the story did not start as rosy as it is often painted.
India did the exact same thing as their Constitution was enforced on 26th January 1950 where its Article 343 held that the official language of India shall be Hindi in the Devanagari script and this was before Pakistan even had a constitution. The system was working in line with the the British had left and the Constitutional framework for Pakistan at that time was the Government of India Act 1935 and the Independence Act 1947. So in 1950 a diverse nation like India also needed a linguistic bridge and Hindi seemed the most apt since it was spoken by more people and English was used as a central language, was to be phased out but Hindi alone was resisted and the parliament was forced to extend the date because Hindi faced the same limitation that Urdu faced that was world was being globalized and English was a major part of that world. In 1963 India did pass the Languages official Act which held that a committee shall be passed which shall translate the english texts (Proceedings of the parliament at that time were in English) into Hindi and section 6 and 7 held that any state can use local languages for state parliament and State High Court.
Section 6 Authorised Hindi translation of State Acts in certain cases.
Where the Legislature of a State has prescribed any language other than Hindi for use in Acts passed by the Legislature of the State or in Ordinances promulgated by the Governor of the State, a translation of the same in Hindi, in addition to a translation thereof in the English language as required by clause (3) of article 348 of the Constitution, may be published on or after the appointed day under the authority of the Governor of the State in the Official Gazette of that State and in such a case, the translation in Hindi of any such Act or Ordinance shall be deemed to be the authoritative text thereof in the Hindi language.
Section 7. Optional use of Hindi or other official language in judgments etc., of High Courts.
.
As from the appointed day or any day thereafter, the Governor of a State may, with the previous consent of the President, authorise the use of Hindi or the official language of the State, in addition to the English language, for the purposes of any judgment, decree or order passed or made by the High Court for that State and where any judgment, decree or order is passed or made in any such language (other than the English language), it shall be accompanied by a translation of the same in the English language issued under the authority of the High Court.
This act was forced to be passed due to the massive linguistic diversity in India most notable of it being in the Dravidian languages and the tribal languages in the East with the Indo-Aryan languages in populous northern India.
Infact India is even a greater mess since they now need two Lingua Francas as many states were open to Hindi and preferred English as the Lingua Franca and many protested like hell when this act was passed and there was an amendment in 1967 where it was held that English could only be removed when a resolution was passed by every state that had not adopted the language. It is still a pretty big battle for example states which had Hindi as their official; language are allowed to use Hindi as Court language in
High Court but not others save for Tamil Nadu and i think that is largely for Tamil people and all that happened with Tamil independence. Its actually complicated in its usage however we should have adopted something similar and by the 60s, we had a dictator that could do that. I am sure guys like
@Joe Shearer have more info on this than i do.
Lastly indus i know you want there to be a wall of fire between anything Indian and Pakistan but i am not sold on Urdu.
