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Names of Urdu Language was nominated for deletion. The discussion was closed on 25 March 2021 with a consensus to merge. Its contents were merged into Urdu. The original page is now a redirect to this page. For the contribution history and old versions of the redirected article, please see its history; for its talk page, see here.

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Current Description

The current description may not be to the liking of many Misplaced Pages users and readers because, Urdu has the status of national language and language of public communication (lingua franca) in Pakistan, where it is also the official language, along with English. And the educated population of Pakistan who took over the bureaucracy and finance department of Pakistan, etc. were Urdu speakers, who were Muhajirs. Also, Sir Syed, Liaquat Ali Khan, Ali brothers, etc. are considered important names in the history of Pakistan, all of them spoke Urdu as their mother tongue. Therefore, I request to change this description from "Language spoken in India and Pakistan" to "Language spoken in Pakistan and India" or "Language spoken chiefly in South Asia" so that the people reading it do not feel anything biased or unsatisfying, especially the population of India and Pakistan. Thank you very much. AlidPedian (talk) 16:00, 1 December 2024 (UTC)

@Professor Penguino Kindly answer me. I look forward to your reply. AlidPedian (talk) 10:18, 3 December 2024 (UTC)

I think changing the short description to "Language spoken chiefly in South Asia" would be good. Unfortunately, the article isn't letting me change it. Professor Penguino (talk) 06:20, 4 December 2024 (UTC)

I doubt anyone is going to perceive bias when they read the words "India and Pakistan" unless they have a huge chip on their shoulder. PepperBeast (talk) 15:00, 3 December 2024 (UTC)

Of course we did, but the old-India-POV editors, unable to accept the reality

• that Urdu has declined markedly in its birthplace in India even among many educated Muslim families;
• that on the BBC Urdu website only 10% of the posters are from addresses in India, the rest no longer able to read the Urdu script, let alone write;
• that the only country in which Oxford University Press publishes books in Urdu (both pedagogic and literary) is Pakistan;
• that Bollywood songs with a few words of Urdu in the mix do not constitute Urdu;
• that the birthplace of a language does not produce mother's milk of the language;
• that the average person in Pakistan's whose mother tongue is not Urdu is nevertheless able to read, write, and speak Urdu with more skill that the average "Urdu speaker" in India;
• that in the 75 years since decolonization in South Asia, Pakistan has produced some great Urdu poets, witness, off the top of my head: Faiz Ahmed Faiz, Ada Jafri, Zehra Nigah, Munir Niazi, Nasir Kazmi, Habib Jalib, Ahmad Faraz, Kishwar Naheed, Fahmida Riaz, and Iftikhar Arif, but India, sadly, has produced nothing that can match, only Bollywood songwriters such as Javed Akhtar or Gulzar whom Indians consider to be Urdu poets.

very determinedly never allowed us to change anything in this article and also in Hindustani language, a subterfuge employed in contempory India for expanding the definition of Urdu to include any pidgin-Hindi speaker in India.

PS I don't have a chip on my shoulder. Among other things I have written the FA India).

PPS It's not like I haven't tried. I've certainly collected more sources than anyone before or after. See:

• Talk:Urdu/Archive_12#Fowler&fowler's_references_from_1836_to_2019, sadly all for nought.

Fowler&fowler«Talk» 18:26, 3 December 2024 (UTC)

PS Not that anything will change in this page's lead, but the Britannica article on Urdu begins: "Urdu language, member of the Indo-Aryan group within the Indo-European family of languages. Urdu is spoken as a first language by nearly 70 million people and as a second language by more than 100 million people, predominantly in Pakistan and India." Fowler&fowler«Talk» 18:37, 3 December 2024 (UTC)

PPS The Oxford English Dictionary entry on Urdu, n. & adj. states: An Indo-Aryan language of northern South Asia (now esp. Pakistan), closely related to Hindi but written in a modified form of the Arabic script ... Fowler&fowler«Talk» 18:44, 3 December 2024 (UTC)

• Note: I've changed it to South Asia based on the discussion here. Fowler, the death of Urdu in India may be greatly exaggerated - despite the dearth of poets and the overall decline in the number of speakers. There are several Urdu newspapers for example and therefore, presumably, plenty of Urdu speakers. RegentsPark (comment) 15:37, 4 December 2024 (UTC)

  Thanks. Very true, RP, about the newspapers. I've often wondered about that. They are probably read in Muslim neighborthoods, and to that extent, the ghettoization of Muslims in India has perhaps had a salutary effect, for sprinkled among the majority, the newspapers would not have survivived, let lone sprouted anew. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 15:36, 8 December 2024 (UTC)

  And it is taught presumably widely if to few in the NCERT curriculum. See for example the textbooks from grades one through twelve.

  Perhaps there will be a rebirth, for the script is important in the language, perhaps more so than some other languages. A simple example is place names. In Urdu, the -abad constructions (abad=settled by) are usually two separate words: Feroze Abad, Farrukh Abad, Ghazi Abad, Faisal Abad, ... they give you a glimpse into a cultural history. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 16:02, 8 December 2024 (UTC)

User:Fowler&fowler, if you recall, we established a consensus version of the lede, in which you placed the information about Urdu being a Persianised register as the second sentence (see this diff). I have restored that wording though if you have again changed your mind, you must, per WP:BRD restore the version of the article before your edits until a new consensus is reached. I have added another reference that buttresses the non-disptued linguistic information. Thanks for your understanding, Anupam 22:14, 10 December 2024 (UTC)

Native to

@Fowler&fowler @Professor Penguino @Pepperbeast @RegentsPark Thanks for the consideration, I have also noticed that in the "Native to" section of the template, it says "India and Pakistan". I would also like to request that "Pakistan and India" or "Pakistan, Hindi-Urdu Belt, and Deccan" be written here instead, because of the same reason, I provided in my previous request. Thanks once again. 💗 AlidPedian (talk) 20:24, 7 December 2024 (UTC)

@Professor Penguino @Fowler&fowler @RegentsPark @Pepperbeast Kindly respond. AlidPedian (talk) 22:55, 9 December 2024 (UTC)

Well, what do you understand by "native to?" Fowler&fowler«Talk» 23:24, 9 December 2024 (UTC)

@Fowler&fowler If "Native to" refers here to the place where Urdu originated, then only India should be written here, because Urdu originated from there (the present-day Northern India, and not from the present-day Pakistan). Obviously, It is not the case. The article of Turkish language has multiple countries in this section. But if it refers to the places from where this language is flourishing and had significant development, then Pakistan should be written here first (along with India). Because if Modern Standard Urdu is the tenth most-spoken language in the world today, the main reason for this is because it is the national language and lingua franca of Pakistan, and also the significant number of Urdu-speakers, who stayed in India after the partition of India. And that is why I requested that it be written here as "Pakistan and India" or "Pakistan, Hindi-Urdu belt, and Deccan region." AlidPedian (talk) 14:03, 10 December 2024 (UTC)

It seems "Native to" will become (no matter how you rephrase) a slightly different version of the next argument in the infobox, "Region."

So, unless there is consensus around, something very specific, such as the Muslim military encampments of northeastern Delhi, Ghaziabad, and Muradnagar. (cf. the later, Mughal, "Zaban-e-Urdu-Mualla," language of the exalted camp), or if you want to go back further, viz to Amir Khusrow and list the region of Hazrat Nizamuddin Dargah, Delhi, it is best to leave the "Native to" argument blank. What do you think @RegentsPark: Fowler&fowler«Talk» 15:57, 10 December 2024 (UTC)

I have no opinion on this. As a matter of personal preference, I would leave it blank because languages (natural languages) don't suddenly arise out of nothing. However, if there are definitive sources then that's a different matter. RegentsPark (comment) 16:39, 10 December 2024 (UTC)

I would actually recommend listing the locations such as those that User:Fowler&fowler mentioned, including Delhi, Meerut and Saharanpur in the "Native to" parameter. Students' Britannica India (2000) states:

Hindustani developed as lingua franca in the medieval ages in and around Delhi, Meerut and Saharanpur because of the interaction between the speakers of Khariboli (a dialect developed in this region out of Shauraseni Prakrit) and the speakers of Persian, Turkish, and various dialects of Arabic who migrated to North India. Initially it was known by various names such as Rekhta (mixed), Urdu (language of the camp) and Hindvi or Hindustani (language of Hindustan).

I see no reason to leave out this information as the native region of Urdu is well sourced. Kind regards, Anupam 22:10, 10 December 2024 (UTC)

That being said, if consensus is to leave it blank, I would not particularly push for this. I hope this helps. Anupam 22:50, 10 December 2024 (UTC)

I looked at {{Infobox language}} and it seems to me that the "native to" attribute refers to the places where it is spoken, not where it originated (see the list of countries listed in the Farsi example). In which case, South Asia would probably be the right entry. RegentsPark (comment) 01:40, 11 December 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for the clarification User:RegentsPark! Feel free to change it to "South Asia". With regards, Anupam 03:06, 11 December 2024 (UTC)

If my opinion is taken, I would also emphasize more on changing it to "South Asia", because even before the partition of India, the Urdu-language literature was flourishing not only in present-day India, but also in present-day Pakistan and present-day Bangladesh. The examples of this are Allama Muhammad Iqbal (the poet of Urdu, from Sialkot) and the Dhakaiya dialect of Urdu. AlidPedian (talk) 20:54, 11 December 2024 (UTC)

I have went ahead and made the change, while adding the aforementioned reference to the article. I hope this helps. Kind regards, Anupam 16:15, 12 December 2024 (UTC)

You guys cant just change country names to region names because of political disputes and tensions. The source i cited mentions that Urdu is native to both Pakistan and India. 'Native to' means the language has linguistic roots in both India and Pakistan and originated from these two countries. 'Non-indigenous' as indicated on the source for example in the USA or Bangladesh means the language is not originally from the said countries and was introduced by later immigrants or in other words by later migration. South Asia is also not a country but a region in Asia. 'States' is another synonym for 'countries'. Many other wikipedia pages for languages spoken in countries with political tensions freely add the country names on their language infobox information. Removing Pakistan and India on the langusge infobox is not going to help solve political disputes or tensions or controversies between two countries and peoples on a wikipedia language information page. Readers should clearly know without direct or indirect bias that Urdu is native to both India and Pakistan, whike the region should be changed to South Asia since South Asia is not a country again. Thank You. Cookiemonster1618 (talk) 13:50, 17 December 2024 (UTC)

@Fowler&fowler @Professor Penguino @Pepperbeast @Anupam please respond to my objection request and understand what I have said and if this reason is strong for you to change it back to 'Native to India and Pakistan'. Thank You. Cookiemonster1618 (talk) 13:55, 17 December 2024 (UTC)

"South Asia" is fine and consensus developed here established this. The next parameter of the infobox ("Native to") already mentions Pakistan and India; duplicating the same information is redundant. If we are being precise, as User:Fowler&fowler mentioned, the "Native to" parameter would specify "northeastern Delhi, Ghaziabad, and Muradnagar". Anupam 14:34, 17 December 2024 (UTC)

where in the source (Ethnologue) does it mention native to 'northeastern Delhi, Grazia address, and Muradnagar'? Those would be 'locations'. India and Pakistan are countries so under the language entry it would be written as 'Native to' under the comments section. Cookiemonster1618 (talk) 15:16, 17 December 2024 (UTC)

@Cookiemonster1618 No one is editing the 'native to' section due to political conflicts. That's your idea, sir. And "South Asia" is completely fine here. As I mentioned earlier, Urdu has a dialect called Dhakaiya. And for your concern, Delhi and the surrounding areas are mentioned in the first reference. And thus the reader will obviously be aware of Urdu being native to India and Pakistan. AlidPedian (talk) 15:53, 17 December 2024 (UTC)

Nepal

Urdu is usually described as a language of South Asia or a language of India and Pakistan. Jieun Kiaer, Associate Professor in Oriental Studies at the University of Oxford, describes the language as follows in the text Pragmatic Particles: Findings from Asian Languages (2020):

Urdu is a Persianized and standardized register of the Hindustani language. It is the national language and lingua franca of Pakistan, and an official language of five states in India.

I have therefore moved the information about it being a dialect spoken in Nepal to the body of the article. I do not believe that there will be any objections to this, though if there are, please state them here. Thanks, Anupam 22:38, 10 December 2024 (UTC)

Dear @Anupam and RegentsPark:, I have moved the bit about Urdu being the "Persian register of the Hindustani language" from the lead paragraph where it stood out by its sheer incongruity, to the second paragraph, where it is thematically meaningful. I have also explained for the benefit of a ordinary reader what Hindustani language, also Hindi-Urdu, is, to give the paragraph some narrative coherence. I agree with Anupam that the Nepal bit is not lead-worthy, and thank them for moving it to a later section. Although I have not consciously removed anything, my edits seemed to have reduced the "bytes." Perhaps, unconsciously, I have removed a citation. If so, please restore it. But please don't put the "Persianized register" back in the lead paragraph, previous consensus or not, because it drew attention in a negative and entirely unmeaningful, way. Best regards, Fowler&fowler«Talk» 14:31, 11 December 2024 (UTC)

PS I have also corrected "Western Uttar Pradesh" piped to "Ganga-Jumna doab" in the third paragraph. The doab, or the interfluve, or tongue of high ground between the Ganges and Yamuna river valleys, extends south to Allahabad. The spawning grounds of Urdu are very specific—what are today the districts of Meerut division in Western Uttar Pradesh, adjoining Delhi. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 15:04, 11 December 2024 (UTC)

The lede looks significantly improved. Thanks for your efforts User:Fowler&fowler. Anupam 15:42, 11 December 2024 (UTC)

I completely lacked scrutinty with this revert, since I only was triggered by the odd phrase "language member", but failed to see that I accidentally restored some recent changes to the opening sentence that I don't endorse at all. Of course, like the vast majority of good sources, we should open by saying that Urdu is a language, and put it into a classificatory framework ("...is an Indo-Aryan..."), say where it is natively sopken and mention it importance based on its status as a national language of Pakistan and as an official language in various Indian states. It is important to inform the reader about its special nature in relation to Hindi, but this comes second after the key facts in the first paragraph. So I agree with Anupam, the lead now looks much better with Fowler&fowler (talk · contribs)'s changes.

There is however one inaccuracy that needs to be tackled: "Urdu and Hindi share a common Sanskrit- and Prakrit-derived vocabulary base...". We all know that Hindi and Urdu are identical twins that – so to speak – look alike in the bathroom and when sitting at the kitchen table, but become increasingly different the more formal they dress. However, the common base is not fully "Sanskrit- and Prakrit-derived", for instance, Hindi कुरसी, लेकिन and बाद belong to this very base and are not "Sanskrit- and Prakrit-derived". The shared pathways of Urdu and Hindi (even when the latter is understood in a wide sense) long postdates the Prakrit period: the literary language of Delhi and its Indo-Aryan siblings in the region underwent common Perso-Arabic influence, and also internally-driven changes in phonology and grammar that signficantly depart from the Prakrit past.

As a first remedy, I will add "predominantly" to "Sanskrit- and Prakrit-derived", but suggest to eventually replace it simply with "Urdu and Hindi share a common vocabulary base". We already know from the lead that Urdu is an Indo-Aryan language; we wouldn't say this if it didn't originate from a Sanskrit- and Prakrit-derived base. –Austronesier (talk) 12:07, 12 December 2024 (UTC)

That bit had been there from earlier and I did not change it, but I agree. Common words such as the ones you mention @Austronesier:, and others such as Urdu mayz, from Arabic (cf mesa), or kameez also from Arabic (cf chemise) are there in Urdu in good numbers. One could hazard the guess that as the Muslims brought the art of sewing clothes to the subcontinent many words associated with it would have come from Arabic or Persian. darzi, the Urdu/Hindi word for tailor is one such word. It would probably apply to words arisign from other Muslim-introduced technologies. Have to run, but thank you. Please go ahead and make the change. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 13:00, 12 December 2024 (UTC)

... (later) Urdu script can sometimes, but not always, give a clue to the origin of words. Thus ba'd, the Urdu word for "after", which is written in Hindi as बाद as you stated, is however written in Urdu as بعد (with the Arabic ain) and not باد i.e. with a simple alif or aa after the b.

کرسی kursi, or chair, as you say, is from Arabic, though in this instant, the script alone does not give a clue.

ميز mez (table) is a different type of example, as there is no z sound in Sanskrit, ... and many Indo-Aryan languages. This is probably why the Indian prime minister who is a native Gujarati speaker is unable to pronounce آزادی, azadi (freedom), at least when he's not watching himself, preferring ajahadi instead.

دروازه darwaza, door, is from Persian, but کواڑ किवाड़ kiwāR, a less formal word for door is from Prakrit. The ड़ retroflex construction doesn't exist in Persian and Arabic, and a diacritic had to be added to the r or ر

Anyway I am carrying coals to Newcastle, so I better stop. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 14:59, 12 December 2024 (UTC)

I think the addition of the word "predominantly" was a good move, given that certain Persian loanwords, such as those that User:Fowler&fowler cited, have become established in Hindi-Urdu. I believe that the mention of the Indic (Sanskritic/Prakritic) base is important as our readers might not necessarily know what an Indo-Aryan language is. Kind regards, Anupam 16:07, 12 December 2024 (UTC)

(edit conflict) I have deliberately chosen Hindi examples (even if this is the talk page for the Urdu article), to emphasize the absurdity of describing the common ground of Urdu and Hindi as solely "Sanskrit- and Prakrit-derived" and Urdu as a "Persiansized" register in one breath, which will potentially make an uninitiated reader believe that Urdu and Hindi parted ways before any "Persiansization" had taken place, and thus reinforce the ideological POV that Hindi is the autochthonous, primordially "pure" member of the pair, which is of course wrong. When Urdu and Hindi speakers meet on the common ground of low-brow discourse (the register of Hindi–Urdu that is occasionally called "Hindustani" by sociolinguists) their largely – apart from some shibboleths – indistinguishable speech will have quite many Perso-Arabic elements in it that had been accumulated in the many centuries before the creation of a modern Delhi-based "Hindi" in the 19th century. And that's regardless of their self-identification with "Hindi" or "Urdu", which generally manifests itself in the script, the target pronunciation of certain sounds and in lexcial choices in mid- to high-brow discourse (but only when people decide to not code-switch to English in such a context, as they often do) to the point of indeed producing two distinct literary languages. –Austronesier (talk) 16:20, 12 December 2024 (UTC)

Nastaliq

There's often a confusion between the writing system used to write Urdu, and the style that Urdu is written in. Nastaliq (like Shekasta) is a style of writing Urdu. It isn't a separate script.

• it adopted the Nastaleeq writing system
• ("the language of the exalted camp") written in Nastaʿlīq script
• The Urdu Nastaʿliq alphabet

The script used to write Urdu is called the Perso-Arabic script, or simply the Urdu alphabet. نعم البدل (talk) 16:13, 12 December 2024 (UTC)

@نعم البدل: Oh yes, please go ahead and fix it. That's an error based on an amateur understanding of the Perso-Arabic script that keeps on creeping into Urdu-related articles (note that the only source that actually talks about a "Nastaliq script" is a Lonely Planet language guide(!), a generally odd choice as a source for an encyclopaedia). –Austronesier (talk) 16:31, 12 December 2024 (UTC)

Amendments made! نعم البدل (talk) 18:15, 12 December 2024 (UTC)

A request to enter another required information in the Post-Partition (History) section

In the section, History (Post-Partition), kindly include that in the early days of Pakistan, Urdu-speaking people (Muhaiirs) played a significant role in managing the country's bureaucracy, finance department and other major institutions, and they also established banks there. And that the mother tongue of majority of the founding fathers of Pakistan was Urdu.

Personally, if I were to mention one thing, Dr. Tarek Fatah (a Pakistani-Canadian journalist and author) mentioned somewhere that Muhammad Ali Jinnah gave Urdu the status of Pakistan's state language precisely because Urdu-speakers could run bureaucracy, finance departments, and more in Pakistan. (Although I have a YouTube link for the video, I don't have any reference for that, https://www.youtube.com/watch?si=ppTVjgRJSi5DVYPi&v=JOllroCaLQg&feature=youtu.be)"

It is an important part of the history of Urdu in Pakistan.

References

• Lieven, Anatol (2011). Pakistan : a hard country (1st ed.). New York: PublicAffairs. ISBN 978-1-61039-021-7. OCLC 710995260.

References

1. Nabbo, Habbo (2023-02-06). "Socio-economic Status of Muhajirs (2023)". Scribd. Retrieved 2023-02-06.

AlidPedian (talk) 11:01, 22 December 2024 (UTC)

@Anupam @Fowler&fowler @RegentsPark @Professor Penguino Kindly share your thoughts. AlidPedian (talk) 08:48, 23 December 2024 (UTC)

I have added some information to the article regarding this, as requested. More information on the role the Muhajirs played in establishing Pakistan could be added to the articles about Muhajirs and the Pakistan Movement. Kind regards, Anupam 18:50, 23 December 2024 (UTC)

Thank you very much, sir. You included the information on my request. I am very grateful to you. However, sir, what I meant was that it is necessary to provide this information as part of the history that in the early days of Pakistan, Urdu speakers (Muhaiirs) played a significant role in managing the country's bureaucracy, finance department, and other major institutions, and they also established banks in the country. And that the majority of the founding fathers of Pakistan were Urdu-speakers, this addition is very important, as it is an important part of the history of Urdu in Pakistan. Thank you very much, respected sir. 🥰 AlidPedian (talk) 08:49, 24 December 2024 (UTC)

Excess cites

@Fowler&fowlerI removed excess cites because it was already tagged and an unsourced image. Trimmed words as well and removed an idiom because it belongs somewhere else not on the first para on origins. Axedd (talk) 12:52, 27 December 2024 (UTC)

Your explanation is a bit too vague and your edit summaries too brief for me to make sense of your edits. I defer to @Anupam and Austronesier: here. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 16:54, 27 December 2024 (UTC)

User:Fowler&fowler, thank you for inviting me to the discussion. User:Axedd, the references (with quote parameters) are in place to ensure that anonymous IP editors and others do not not remove information that has been carefully worded over time. As such, please do not remove them. The image is relevant and does contain a reference; the body of the article discusses the development of Urdu in Delhi, Meerut and Saharanpur, with it being refined in Lucknow. Thanks for your understanding, Anupam 17:09, 27 December 2024 (UTC)

The whole of that area is not sourced though, hence making the image vague and meaningless.I might return later to this for now Axedd (talk) 21:58, 27 December 2024 (UTC)

I agree with Anupam that it's good to have multiple sources here. The history of the language that came to be known as Urdu in the 18th century is complex and contentious. POVs of exclusive ownership or denial of Urdu's erstwhile status as a supra-communal literary language regularly get inserted here. Overcite can also be mended by WP:CITEMERGE, a solution that I strongly prefer over throwing out high-quality sources like King's book. –Austronesier (talk) 09:38, 28 December 2024 (UTC)

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