Amrita Pritam

Pardesi #64: ``However, DB and many other Indian Punjabis feel that shame is really upon the Punjabi elite who are measuring their honor in terms of material wealth and not in their own history, language and culture.``

I think the position of Punjabis in Pakistan and in India is at opposite poles. In India, Punjabis are a tiny minority, trying to, ``protect`` their language and culture against a gigantic non-Punjabi majority.

In Pakistan, Punjab has 62% of the country`s population. If you include Kashmiris, all of whom speak Punjabi in Pakistan, every 2 out of 3 people in Pakistan speaks Punjabi or Sariaki. Imagine if there were 650 million people in the province of Punjab in India, and if 700 million Indians spoke Punjabi or a its dialect.

Hence in Pakistan, it is the other provinces who are afraid that Punjab and Punjabi will take them over. There is a large anti-Punjabi feeling in all other provinces. This is why Punjabi probably never became a national language, even though 2 out of 3 Pakistanis undersand it. If it were pushed as the national language, I can gaurantee it that the country would split within a decade........Urdu is acceptable to everyone because it is from the outside......

This is why the attitude of Punjabi speakers in Pakistan is different from those in India. Pakistani Punjabi speakers are not, ``fighting`` for honor etc. of Punjabi. They control the whole country anyways, and try hard to make it look politically correct by not pushing Punjabi everywhere.

It is not the elites who have given up on Punjabi. In fact, the elites have attempted to revive it somewhat. It is the common person on the street who wants to move onto Urdu and then English. Some of the, ``elites`` are actually pushing Punjabi medium of instruction. I doubt any poor person would buy that idea, and would always send his kid to an Urdu, or preferably an English medium school, because that is the demand of the market............

This is something Indian Punjabi speakers need to understand. And I think they are getting unnecessarily emotional, because they feel Punjabi is being, ``killed`` in Pakistan. It isn`t. The Punjabis are themselves moving on to other more economically beneficial languages. And Pakistani Punjabis are not to insecure about this, because, ethnically speaking, Punjabis dominate the country..............

dionysus:

Glad that my post brought you out of your sumber. :-)

Before partition, all Punjabis irrespective of their religion used Punjabi in daily discourse and Urdu as their language of written communication. Even the Punjabi poets of the time of the Partition, such as Tara Chand Azad, Teja Singh Sabar, Kedarnath(?) Baaghi wrote in the Urdu script.

You are right about one thing: Before the partition, most of the contribution to Punjabi literature was from Muslim Punjabis, except for the contribution of Sikh gurus, much of which was actually in Braj Bhasha. This is why abandoning of their language by Muslims is so tragic.

Another point crossed my mind.

Punjabis never ruled Punjab during last 1000 odd years until 1947(which was too late) with the exception of 60 yrs of Sikh rule.

Muslims rulers were never Punjabis, they could speak Punjabi but their mother toungues were always Farsi, Arabic, Turkish or Urdu(later on).

If the ``sambar dosa eating`` Tamils and ``bhaat eating`` Bengalis can sacrifice and stand up for their language and culture with pride and fervor, why can`t the `martial` Punjabi stand up for their identity? Because they are inferiority complexed hijras who love to clap and twirl to a foreigner`s tune. Tamils` and Bengalis` religious texts is not in Bengali or Tamil. Tamil is Dravadian lingo and no relation to Sanskrit.

ALL factors contributed to the decay of Punjabi. Religion biases, political agendas, complexes, TNT etc. Everyone should bear the blame equally. Hindus, Muslims and Sikhs are equally responsible for their mother tongue`s decay.

There are lot of dedicated and passionate Punjabis in all religions who are working not only to save Punjabi, but revive it in its original and authentic form. So, the future is not as bleak as some pessimists and illwishers see.

Re: # 75
#75 you are very polar personality.
Drlokraj: eNu Koi Nuqsa Tajweej Kar deyo.

Trauma of Parition was caused by Hindus and Sikhs, Wah bhai Wah! Bahut Khoob!
Who asked for Pakistan at first place? Was it Hindus and Sikhs?

I can understand that Hindus and Sikhs were a participant in Violence, but to say that Muslims were living with Flowers in their hands inncocently is an insult to all those innocents who died in 1947.

If you don`t trust us, then I suggest that you talk with any older surviving Englishman or American who lived in Punjab during 1947. They will tell you their neutral accounts as they saw it.

Delhiwala,no use digging into the roots,lets talk about ground realities.
I did not say that akalis alone were responsible for second division of punjab.Their mistake was accepting the division based on that false census.They were glad to accept it just because of the sikh majority in the new state.

dost mittar #72 ``Punjabi suffered not because it is an inferior language, but because it became a victim of the two-nation theory in Punjab, where Urdu got identified with Muslims and Hindi with Hindus``

Bullshit. As usual you can`t resist putting your pro-India spin on everything. Punjabi Hindus had already started to disown their mother tongue in favour of Hindu-Urdu during the late 19th century LONG before the TNT and at a time when Punjabi Muslims were still producing poets and writers of the calibre of Mian Mohammed Baksh and Khwaja Ghulam Farid, the greatest Punjabi poet of them all. During the British era Punjabi Muslims used Urdu only has a matter of practicallity - it was an official language imposed by the colonial power. Punjabi Muslims only started identifying with Urdu AFTER the trauma of the partition of Punjab which I don`t need to remind you was done at the behest of Punjabi Hindus and Sikhs.

``The same lack of self esteem which prevents Pakistani elite from taking ownership of Mohenjodoro and (re)naming their cities as Islamabad and Faislabad, instead of Porus Nagar or Warasnagri [...]

Islamabad is a good two hour drive on very modern roads from Porus` hometown. What sense does it make to name it after him?

drlokraj:

Thanks for the information about the early ghazal writers in Punjabi.

Delhiwalla has a point if you replace Punjabi with Gurmukhi script. I think it is fair to say that but for SGGS being in the Gurmukhi script, Sikhs may not have stood up for the Punjabi language as they did, even though most of SGGS is in Braj Bhasha. While it is fashionable for everyone, including myself, to blame the Hindus for abandoning their language (by saying , as you hinted, ``hamari mattar basha Hindi hai``), the fact is that they were confused between the script and language. If Akalis had at any time proposed that people were free to use either Gurmukhi or Devnagri script (something suggested at one time, I believe, by Bhagat Singh), the situation might have been different. I do not agree with Romair`s prediction of demise of Punjabi in Pakistan, but it would almost certainly prosper in the Persian script with which Pakistanis are more familiar.

Excuse me Sir,
South Indian languages are derived from Indo Aryan semantic tree that is based on Sanskrit(language of Hindus).

Not every cultural entity is same, Europeans had a distinct culture and they became Christian while retaining their
old values.
During the last 600 yrs thanks to renaissance they have made tremendous progress in socio-civic sense.
Languages are not a life threatening factor for them, unlike us.

Sikhs/Pakistanis are mostly converts from some other religion during last 300-400 years. They are more fanatic in preserving their new identities and disasccociating themselves from older roots.

For e.g a Pakistan`s official stand is to somehow prove that India/Hindus never happened to Pakistanis and they have always lived as sovereign state.(read their official websites, there is no mention of Sikhs/Hindus anywhere).

For Sikhs Gurmukhi is theri main script and that clearly connects them to Punjabi, hence Punjabi as a Mother toungue.
Yes, it is true that SGGS has verses in Braj, Sanskrit, Hindi, Farsi, Arabic, Marathi etc.
However the main theme is Punjabi using phrases and vocabulary of other languages prevalent at that time.

I can agree with you that my statement is not applicable globally, but it is cent-per-cent true for North Indians.
Othewise, why would Punjabi speaking Hindus define their mother toungue as Hindi in 50ies.

Also, my friend you are wrong about Akalis causing a break of Punjab in India.
Punjabi Hindus in 1950ies had become more Hindus, whereas in United Punjab majority of the Hindus would goto Gurudwaras and actually live a life as a Sikh. After partition, this relationship of Hindu/Sikh amity was broken by revival of Hindus coming from rest of the India. This led to Punjabi Hindus defining themselves as Hindi speaking. Akalis had no choice but to resort to what they did. Otherwise, Indira Gandhi would have clearly pushed the policy of Religous demarcations and due to weight of Hindi speaking people in (Punjab, Haryana, Himachal and parts of UP), Sikhs would have lost their voice.
Sikh fate would have been no different than Jains. FYI, Sikhs are not 52% but 60% in E Punjab.

Let us see what you have to say......

Romair#49

Your analysis is correct superficially, but for deeper causes, you have to look more carefully at what db/dr/kaura are saying. Punjabi suffered not because it is an inferior language, but because it became a victim of the two-nation theory in Punjab, where Urdu got identified with Muslims and Hindi with Hindus. It is true that Hindu and Muslim elite after the Partition showed a disdain for their mother tongue. I believe that the situation has changed among the younger HIndus in Punjab who seem to be making a healthy contribution to the Punjabi arts and literature.

As for Pakistan, the Punjbai elite continue to treat their mother tongue with disdain. Even people like you who seem to show a healthy curiousity for the language seem to contemplate its demise with equanimity, if not outright welcome it, to pave the way for an Urdu-based civilization. If without any economic incentives, Sindhis can fight for their language, Pathans for Pushto, Baluchis for Bruhi (?) and Bengalis were prepared to secede for their language, why not Punjabis? The same lack of self esteem which prevents Pakistani elite from taking ownership of Mohenjodoro and (re)naming their cities as Islamabad and Faislabad, instead of Porus Nagar or Warasnagri, also seems to prevent them from taking ownership of their language in preference to the language of what you now call the Gangetic civilization.

Re: # 63
Drlokraj,
what shabad are you referring to?

Delhiwala,just to add to what kaura has already said,language of Guru Granth Sahib is difficult to define.Yes,its script is Gurmukhi,but the language is mostly braj bhaasha and is more closer to hindi rather punjabi.You know SGGS has works of so many saints/bhakts from all over the hindi belt of India.Guru Gobind Singh`s writings are either in braj or in persian.By your notion,all south Indians who are not hindi speaking are not hindus because hindi is the language of hindus??
This ideology of akalis and fundamental hindus was responsible for second division of punjab when lot of hindu majority areas became part of haryana or himachal just because hindus of those areas refused to accept punjabi as their mother tongue(and bloody bastards uttered these words in punjabi itself during 1961 census).Even today,the ratio in punjab is 52:48(sikhs:hindus).If you add the number of punjabis on the other side of the border as well,then sikhs are in minority,so how can you associate religeon and language?

Kaurya,
Tu Eveye Pungay na Paiya Kur. Baaj Aaja.

English is a World Language because it was thrust over by Anglophones because of their dominance of the World scene for the last 500 odd years or so.
FYI, Christianities original language was Aramaic, precursor to Hebrew and Arabic, it is a forgotten language now.

But in our part of the World where religion is the main driving force, specially for Pakistanis, Punjabi is not a language to be proud of for them. Like romair had said there is no incentive to speak Punjabi in Pakistan. At least in Indian Punjab you have some theoretic chance of getting a job if you know Punjabi. Interestingly enough because literacy rate is very low in W Punjab, they have preserved the original form of spoken Punjabi. Not many Sikhs would use words like ``Dadha, MainDa, Wangar`` etc.

If Sikhs did not have Gurumukhi what would be our lingual fate then? Ever wonder.

Background of Punjabi as a Language:
Earliest recorded words were written in 4th Century by Surushtra(an Ayurvedic practitioner).
Thanesar, near Panipat has inscriptions that sound like Punjabi.
Next trace of Punjabi-usage is found in Han Sangs travelougues.
Earliest modern day Punjabi words are found in Sheikh Farid`s poems(in SGGS)
In the times of Razia Sultana, Punjabi is also recorded as a Language spoken by Gujjars and Jatts.
Guru Nanak`s Asa di War, clearly uses the Punjabi words of that time and gives historical perspective of that time.

In 16th/17th century, Fanatic Muslims wanted to Persianize India, they superimposed Farsi. Even in Ranjit Singh`s court official language was Farsi. Ranjit was definitely a Secular personality, and he went overboard by having Farsi as the official language.

Anyways, Except in East Punjab, status of Punjabi is definitely declining unless Punjabis can overlook their differences and do something about it.

If we take Chowk as a small microcosm of Desis, it is very clear that our differences of Religion and Culture exceeds our love of MaBoli.

Sad....

Dilliwaalay,

Tu Prozac chubb kay naa likhiaa kar.

English is the language of billions of people - most are non Christians. What has language to do with religion? Most South Asians are better versed in English than native languages.

Using your naive and foolish `logic`, there should be no French, German, etc. just one lingo for all Chrstns.

Dumb!

Punjabi language has sufferred immensely in the past century. Ultimately, Punjabis should be held responsible for their own sufferings.

Urdu was introduced by British because there was no developed language in Punjab. The court language was artificially Persian. This was one of Ranjit Singh`s shortcomings and stupidity. Had he developed Punjabi the court and official language, Urdu need not been introduced. British had to bring it in as more or less a necessity.

Urdu was used in official circles. Punjabi still flourished. Partition and the politics before it was the hardest blow to Punjabi. Religious and political interests attacked Punjabi; Muslims opting for Urdu and Hindus for Hindi. They were naive and fools in associating with two alien languages.

NRIs and Punjabis are seeing a renaissance in Punjabi heritage.

The illiteracy amongst W Punjabis is the reason Punjabi has survived in much the authentic form. The not so literate few E Punjabis are the last bastion of Punjabi. The urban Punjabis on both sides speak Hindized or Urduized Punjabi.

Arstoo,

Dasam Granth`s authors are disputed. Guru Gobind Singh ji had 52 poets in his darbar. It could be that they penned some of the works. Many sikhs do not consider these texts including ``mitar piyaray nu haal mureedaan da kehna........`` part of the Granth. Nonetheless, it is part of the sikh heritage.