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[2] [3] The majority of Pakistan's languages belong to the Indo-Iranian group of the Indo-European language family. [ 4 ] [ 5 ] Urdu is the national language and the lingua franca of Pakistan, and while sharing official status with English, it is the preferred and dominant language used for inter-communication between different ethnic groups.
- The National Language of Pakistan
- Provincial Languages of Pakistan
- Minority Languages of Pakistan
- Foreign Languages That Have A Significant Impact in Pakistan
Urdu is not only the official language of Pakistan but also the national language of the country. However, only about 8% of Pakistanis speak Urdu as their first language. However, a vast section of the population speaks it as their second language. The origin of Urdu goes back several centuries, and according to some historians, Urdu has evolved fr...
Punjabi
Punjabi is the most popular of the regional languages of Pakistan. Over 44% of Pakistani Punjabis speak Punjabi as a first language which is written using the Shahmukhi script which uses the Urdu alphabet.
Pashto
Pashto, the official language of neighboring Afghanistan, also has a significant number of speakers in Pakistan. This language of Pakistan is spoken by over 15.42% of the entire population of the country. The Pashto speakers are concentrated in northern Balochistan, Federally Administered Tribal Areas, and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa regions of Pakistan. Pashtun communities in the cities of the country also speak this language. Pashto has a rich literary tradition, and some famous poets who used the P...
Sindhi
Sindhi is spoken as a first language primarily by Pakistanis residing in the Sindh province of the country. Nearly 14.5% of Pakistanis speak this language of Pakistan. Some scholars claim that Sindhi is derived from Sanskrit with Arabic influences and others believe it has its origins in the Sami languages. Sindhi is also spoken by a significant section of the Indian population.
A large number of languages can be included in the category of minority languages of Pakistan and are spoken by minority communities residing in the country. Speakers of these languages number from a few hundreds to a few thousand. Some of these languages are also endangered and might disappear altogether quite soon.
English
As mentioned above, English, the official language of the colonial British Empire, continue to play a major role in Pakistan as one of the official languages of the country. Besides, English, the other important foreign languages of Pakistan are:
Arabic
Since Pakistan is a Muslim major country, Arabic, the religious language of Muslims play a major role in the religious education of the Muslims. The Quran, Hadith, Sunnah and other Islamic religious texts are taught in Arabic and translated in Urdu. A major section of the Muslim population of Pakistan is given some form of informal or formal religious education in the Arabic language.
Persian
Persian was the language spoken by the Royals of the Mughal Empire and served as the cultural and official language of this Empire. As such, it had a high status in the Muslim society in the past. However, the British abolished the official status of Persian during their colonial rule over the Indian sub-continent. Today, only a small section of the Pakistani population speak this language.
- Oishimaya Sen Nag
Urdu is taught as a compulsory subject up to higher secondary school in both English and Urdu medium school systems, which has produced millions of second-language Urdu speakers among people whose native language is one of the other languages of Pakistan – which in turn has led to the absorption of vocabulary from various regional Pakistani languages, [139] while some Urdu vocabularies has ...
Sep 11, 2015 · East Pakistan, which was home to a majority of the Pakistani population who had hoped Bengali would become the second state language after Urdu, seceded in 1971. Image source, AP Image caption,
The National Language Promotion Department (National Language Authority) was established on October 4, 1979, under Article 251 of the Constitution of Pakistan, 1973; to remove difficulties and pave the way for the adoption of Urdu; the national language, as the official language of the country; and present recommendations to the government for its usage as the working medium in all ...
Urdu is the majority language in no large region but is more commonly spoken in North India and is the official administrative language of the state of Jammu and Kashmir. In South India, people in urban Muslim communities in former administrative capitals, such as Hyderabad or Bangalore, may regularly use Urdu at home or in their workplace.*
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Distribution of Pakistanis speaking Urdu as a first language in 1998. Although the majority of Urdu-speakers reside in Pakistan (including 30 million native speakers, [5] and up to 94 million second-language speakers), [12] where Urdu is the national and official language, most speakers who use Urdu as their native tongue live in northern India ...
