<div dir="ltr"><h2 class="gmail-story__title gmail-text--italic gmail-size-eleven"><a href="https://www.dawn.com/news/1334755/literary-notes-national-language-and-pakistani-languages-the-only-way-out" class="gmail-story__link">Literary Notes: National language and Pakistani languages: the only way out</a></h2>
<div class="gmail-my-2"><span class="gmail-story__byline gmail-caps gmail-text--gray gmail-size-three"><a href="https://www.dawn.com/authors/418/rauf-parekh">Rauf Parekh</a></span><span class="gmail-divider gmail-text--gray gmail-divider--hyphen"></span><span class="gmail-story__time gmail-size-three gmail-caps gmail-text--gray"><span class="gmail-timestamp--label">Updated</span> <span class="gmail-timestamp--time gmail-timeago" title="May 23, 2017 07:00am">about 13 hours ago</span></span> </div>
<article class="gmail-story">
<div class="gmail-my-2 gmail-clearfix">
<div class="gmail-social gmail-social--iframe gmail-float-left gmail-pr-2 gmail-pl-0">
</div>
<div class="gmail-social gmail-social--iframe gmail-float-left gmail-pr-2">
</div>
<div class="gmail-social gmail-social--iframe gmail-float-left gmail-pr-2">
</div>
<div class="gmail-social gmail-social--comment gmail-social--label gmail-float-left gmail-pr-2 gmail-d-none gmail-d-sm-block">
<a href="https://www.dawn.com/news/1334755/literary-notes-national-language-and-pakistani-languages-the-only-way-out#comments"> 1 Comment</a>
</div>
<div class="gmail-social gmail-social--email gmail-social--label gmail-float-left gmail-pr-2">
<br>
</div>
<div class="gmail-social gmail-social--print gmail-social--label gmail-float-left gmail-pr-2 gmail-d-none gmail-d-sm-block">
<br>
</div></div>
</article>
<p class="gmail-">AT the one-day
symposium, organised by Idara-i-Farogh-i-Qaumi Zaban (IFQZ) to discuss
the status of Pakistan’s national language and Pakistani languages, the
participants seemed to agree on many issues. But on three points there
was an absolute consensus: 1) every Pakistani language should be
protected and promoted; 2) English should immediately be replaced with
Urdu as official language; 3) there is only one language that should be
Pakistan’s national language and it is Urdu. These thoughts were later
made part of the recommendations unanimously approved. </p><p class="gmail-">The
debate on Pakistan’s national language and Pakistani languages has been
raging ever since the introduction of a proposed constitutional
amendment bill in the National Assembly of Pakistan. Titled Constitution
(Amendment) Bill 2014, the bill sought to amend Article 251 of the 1973
Constitution of Pakistan and proposed that nine Pakistani languages —
namely, Balochi, Balti, Brahvi, Punjabi, Pashto, Shina, Sindhi, Seraiki
and Hindko — be declared Pakistan’s national languages along with Urdu. </p><p class="gmail-">Later,
the proposed bill was introduced in the Senate of Pakistan. Titled The
Proposed Constitution (Amendment) Bill 2016, the bill was approved by a
Senate committee but with amendments. According to Dawn (May 11, 2017),
“the Senate’s Standing Committee on Law and Justice approved on
Wednesday a Constitution[al] amendment Bill to give the status of
national languages to Punjabi, Sindhi, Pashto and Balochi. The committee
approved the bill introduced by Senators Sassui Palijo and Mukhtiar
Ahmed Dhamrah with certain amendments. The amendment to Clause (1) of
Article 251 of the Constitution was proposed to declare Punjabi, Sindhi,
Pashto and Balochi as national languages along with Urdu”.</p><p class="gmail-">This
writer has had the honour of attending four symposia that were convened
to debate the language policy and/or proposed amendment bill, three at
Islamabad and one at Karachi. The first was held at Air University in
October last year. Titled ‘Language Policy Dialogue’, it chose English
as the language of the conference to recommend a language policy for
Pakistan and most of the deliberations were in English. To add insult to
injury, an Indian-origin US scholar was invited to deliver the keynote
address, perhaps an intentional and obvious sign to tell what would be
the shape of things to come. </p><div class="gmail-ad gmail-py-2 gmail-ad--adjustable gmail-my-4 gmail-border--ends gmail-d-none gmail-d-sm-block">
<div class="gmail-ad__label" style="max-width:728px">Advertisement</div>
<div class="gmail-clearfix" style="max-width:728px;max-height:90px;text-align:center;margin:0px auto;overflow:hidden">
<div class="gmail-radWrapper gmail-ad__wrapper" style="width:691px;height:85.4258px;max-width:100%">
</div>
</div>
</div><p class="gmail-">Two more symposia took place on the issue, one at
Pakistan Academy of Letters (PAL) in the last week of February this year
and the other at Karachi University early this month. The fourth one
was organised by IFQZ last week. While most of our nationalist friends
were vociferous at the PAL conference and zealously supported the
proposed bill, many of them seemed shell-shocked and disappointed at the
IFQZ symposium and contrary to their previous stance favoured Urdu as
“the only national language of Pakistan”.</p><p class="gmail-">The reason was
that the proposed amendment bill introduced in the Senate has been
modified and seeks a reduced number of languages to be declared national
languages. It has disillusioned the supporters of the other languages —
namely Balti, Brahvi, Seraiki, Hindko and Shina — that were included in
the bill earlier but have been dropped from the bill approved by the
Senate’s committee. This writer had urged the participants at PAL’s
meeting that declaring a few languages national languages would create a
sense of deprivation among the speakers of other languages and it would
be tantamount to opening a linguistic Pandora’s Box as there are 76
languages spoken in Pakistan. </p><p class="gmail-">The IFQZ symposium offered
some insight as different linguistic, ethnic and national issues came
under the spotlight. Irfan Siddiqi, adviser to the prime minister,
declared in unambiguous terms that “Pakistan’s national language is Urdu
and it should remain undisputed”. Stressing the importance of other
Pakistani languages, Siddiqi said our constitution emphasises the
protection and promotions of the other Pakistani languages. While giving
details of the government’s efforts to implement Urdu as official
language he stressed the government’s “seriousness” on the issue. </p><p class="gmail-">Iftikhar
Arif, IFQZ’s director general, while emphasising respect for the mother
tongues and all Pakistani languages, highlighted the efforts made by
IFQZ (formerly National Language Authority, or NLA) to prepare Urdu for
implementation as official language. Arif said Urdu “is ready in every
respect to be implemented as official language and thousands of
government employees have been trained to use Urdu as official
language”.</p><p class="gmail-">Prof Fateh Mohammad Malik, the former chairman
of NLA, in detail described how the final recommendations were prepared
for implementation of Urdu as official language by NLA in 2007 and
submitted to the then government. He recalled the days when Mufti
Mahmood in NWFP (now KP) and Bizenjo in Balochistan had declared Urdu as
provincial official language and Punjab was about to adopt Urdu, things
were slowed down on political grounds.</p><p class="gmail-">Masood Mufti,
Ehsan Akber, Jaleel Aali, Wahid Bakhsh Buzdar, Jabbar Mirza, Fatema
Hasan, Nasir Abbas Nayyar, Hafeez Khan, Parveen Malik, Mohammad Ziauddin
and some other speakers represented at symposium the different parts
and languages of Pakistan.</p><p class="gmail-">Other recommendations to be
sent to the government through IFQZ included the creation of an
independent language commission, providing funds for protection and
promotion of all Pakistani languages, restoring NLA’s former name and
its authority, allowing provincial assemblies to adopt any Pakistani
language/s as official language/s, declaring Urdu as medium of answers
along with English for all service commissions’ exams, inclusion of nine
major Pakistani languages as optional subject for service commission
exams and adopting Urdu for all judicial proceedings and writing legal
decisions.</p><p class="gmail-">The sprit at IFQZ symposia was that of mutual
respect, national integrity and national identity. The recommendations
presented at the symposia suggest ways to get out of the linguistic
quagmire that the proposed amendment bill has landed the nation into. </p><p class="gmail-"><a href="https://www.dawn.com/news/1334755/literary-notes-national-language-and-pakistani-languages-the-only-way-out">https://www.dawn.com/news/1334755/literary-notes-national-language-and-pakistani-languages-the-only-way-out</a><br></p><br clear="all"><br>-- <br><div class="gmail_signature">**************************************<br>N.b.: Listing on the lgpolicy-list is merely intended as a service to its members<br>and implies neither approval, confirmation nor agreement by the owner or sponsor of the list as to the veracity of a message's contents. Members who disagree with a message are encouraged to post a rebuttal, and to write directly to the original sender of any offensive message. A copy of this may be forwarded to this list as well. (H. Schiffman, Moderator)<br><br>For more information about the lgpolicy-list, go to <a href="https://groups.sas.upenn.edu/mailman/" target="_blank">https://groups.sas.upenn.edu/mailman/</a><br>listinfo/lgpolicy-list<br>*******************************************</div>
</div>