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110-714: Majlis-e Ahrar-e Islam ( Urdu : مجلس احرارلأسلام ), also known as Ahrar for short, is a religious Muslim political party in the Indian subcontinent that was formed during the British Raj (prior to the Partition of India ) on 29 December 1929 at Lahore . The group became composed of Indian Muslims inspired by and supporting the Khilafat Movement , which cleaved closer to the Congress Party . The party

220-642: A dialect continuum ranging from Persianised to Sanskritised vocabulary, but now they are more and more different in words due to politics. Old Urdu dictionaries also contain most of the Sanskrit words now present in Hindi. Mutual intelligibility decreases in literary and specialised contexts that rely on academic or technical vocabulary. In a longer conversation, differences in formal vocabulary and pronunciation of some Urdu phonemes are noticeable, though many native Hindi speakers also pronounce these phonemes. At

330-626: A challenge, though not impossible, citing the fall of the Berlin Wall and the consequent German Reunification as an example. French journalist François Gautier and Pakistani politician Lal Khan have expressed the view that Indian reunification would solve the conflict in the region of Jammu & Kashmir. Arvind Sharma , Professor of Comparative Religion at McGill University , along with Harvey Cox (Professor of Divinity at Harvard University ), Manzoor Ahmad (Professor at Concordia University ) and Rajendra Singh (Professor of Linguistics at

440-406: A core vocabulary of native Sanskrit and Prakrit derived words and a significant number of Arabic and Persian loanwords, with a consensus of linguists considering them to be two standardised forms of the same language and consider the differences to be sociolinguistic ; a few classify them separately. The two languages are often considered to be a single language (Hindustani or Hindi-Urdu) on

550-461: A free and united India. He reasoned that a division of India along religious lines would breed fundamentalism and extremism on both sides of the border. Mashriqi thought that "Muslim majority areas were already under Muslim rule, so if any Muslims wanted to move to these areas, they were free to do so without having to divide the country." To him, separatist leaders "were power hungry and misleading Muslims in order to bolster their own power by serving

660-546: A heavy influence on both as a co-official language. According to Bruce (2021), Urdu has adapted English words since the eighteenth century. A movement towards the hyper-Persianisation of an Urdu emerged in Pakistan since its independence in 1947 which is "as artificial as" the hyper-Sanskritised Hindi that has emerged in India; hyper-Persianisation of Urdu was prompted in part by the increasing Sanskritisation of Hindi. However,

770-477: A lack of medical facilities, in Yousaf's eyes, would not be plaguing an undivided India as it would be more advantaged "economically, politically, and socially." Yousaf has stated that Indians and Pakistanis speak a common lingua franca, Hindustani , "wear the same dress, eat the same food, enjoy the same music and movies, and communicate in the same style and on a similar wavelength". He argues that uniting would be

880-518: A literary medium for Indian writers from the Bombay Presidency, Bengal, Orissa Province, and Tamil Nadu as well. As Urdu and Hindi became means of religious and social construction for Muslims and Hindus respectively, each register developed its own script. According to Islamic tradition, Arabic , the language of Muhammad and the Qur'an , holds spiritual significance and power. Because Urdu

990-539: A majority of Indian Muslims were opposed to partition but sadly they were not heard. They were firm believers of Islam yet they were opposed to Pakistan. In the 1946 Indian provincial elections , the Muslim League got the support mostly from Ashrafs, the upper class Muslims. Lower class Indian Muslims opposed the partition of India, believing that "a Muslim state would benefit only upper-class Muslims." The All India Conference of Indian Christians , representing

1100-595: A notable novel being Umrao Jaan Ada . According to the Navadirul Alfaz by Khan-i Arzu, the "Zaban-e Urdu-e Shahi" [language of the Imperial Camp] had attained special importance in the time of Alamgir ". By the end of the reign of Aurangzeb in the early 1700s, the common language around Delhi began to be referred to as Zaban-e-Urdu , a name derived from the Turkic word ordu (army) or orda and

1210-702: A phonological level, speakers of both languages are frequently aware of the Perso-Arabic or Sanskrit origins of their word choice, which affects the pronunciation of those words. Urdu speakers will often insert vowels to break up consonant clusters found in words of Sanskritic origin, but will pronounce them correctly in Arabic and Persian loanwords. As a result of religious nationalism since the partition of British India and continued communal tensions, native speakers of both Hindi and Urdu frequently assert that they are distinct languages. The grammar of Hindi and Urdu

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1320-589: A policy continued by the Mughal Empire , which extended over most of northern South Asia from the 16th to 18th centuries and cemented Persian influence on Hindustani. Urdu was patronised by the Nawab of Awadh and in Lucknow , the language was refined, being not only spoken in the court, but by the common people in the city—both Hindus and Muslims; the city of Lucknow gave birth to Urdu prose literature, with

1430-507: A sectarian divide of "Urdu" for Muslims and "Hindi" for Hindus, a divide that was formalised with the partition of colonial India into the Dominion of India and the Dominion of Pakistan after independence (though there are Hindu poets who continue to write in Urdu, including Gopi Chand Narang and Gulzar ). Urdu had been used as a literary medium for British colonial Indian writers from

1540-482: A separate, majority Muslim nation state (i.e. the future Pakistan) as a "conspiracy of the colonial government to prevent the emergence of a strong united India". Deobandis therefore helped to organize the Azad Muslim Conference , to condemn the partition of India. They also argued that the economic development of Muslims would be hurt if India was partitioned, seeing the idea of partition as one that

1650-481: A significant role in the development of the Urdu register. Hindi became the distinct register spoken by those who sought to construct a Hindu identity in the face of colonial rule. As Hindi separated from Hindustani to create a distinct spiritual identity, Urdu was employed to create a definitive Islamic identity for the Muslim population in India. Urdu's use was not confined only to northern India – it had been used as

1760-712: A single problem including the Hindu-Muslim problem. On the contrary it intensified the religious differences, especially in connection with the partition of the province of the Punjab, and facilitated the incitement of bloody conflicts between the Hindus, Sikhs and Musulmans. Millions of refugees rushed from one dominion to another. Hindus and Sikhs fled to Hindustan and Muslims to Pakistan. Whole villages were depopulated, harvests were not gathered, fields were not sown. ... armed bands organised on fascist lines, flooded with agents of

1870-614: A symbol of their religious identity. Hindus in northwestern India, under the Arya Samaj agitated against the sole use of the Perso-Arabic script and argued that the language should be written in the native Devanagari script, which triggered a backlash against the use of Hindi written in Devanagari by the Anjuman-e-Islamia of Lahore. Hindi in the Devanagari script and Urdu written in the Perso-Arabic script established

1980-475: A united India in his book Muttahida Qaumiyat Aur Islam (Composite Nationalism and Islam), promulgating the idea that different religions do not constitute different nationalities and that the proposition for a partition of India was not justifiable, religiously. Khaksar Movement leader Allama Mashriqi opposed the partition of India because he felt that if Muslims and Hindus had largely lived peacefully together in India for centuries, they could also do so in

2090-419: A uniting language. Urdu was chosen as a symbol of unity for the new Dominion of Pakistan in 1947, because it had already served as a lingua franca among Muslims in north and northwest of British Indian Empire . Urdu is also seen as a repertory for the cultural and social heritage of Pakistan. While Urdu and Islam together played important roles in developing the national identity of Pakistan, disputes in

2200-465: A vehicle of poetry, (especially under the Bahmanids ), and is known as Dakhini , which contains loanwords from Telugu and Marathi . From the 13th century until the end of the 18th century; the language now known as Urdu was called Hindi , Hindavi , Hindustani , Dehlavi , Dihlawi , Lahori , and Lashkari . The Delhi Sultanate established Persian as its official language in India,

2310-464: A very significant number among the nearly 800 districts of India, there is a small Urdu-speaking minority at least. In Araria district , Bihar, there is a plurality of Urdu speakers and near-plurality in Hyderabad district, Telangana (43.35% Telugu speakers and 43.24% Urdu speakers). Some Indian Muslim schools ( Madrasa ) teach Urdu as a first language and have their own syllabi and exams. In fact,

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2420-441: A world power and keep the two nations dependent on pivotal powers." Yousaf cited former Indian National Congress president Maulana Abul Kalam Azad , who wrote in the same vein: If a united India had become free...there was little chance that Britain could retain her position in the economic and industrial life of India. The partition of India, in which the Muslim majority provinces formed a separate and independent state, would, on

2530-648: Is a Persianised register of the Hindustani language , an Indo-Aryan language spoken chiefly in South Asia . It is the national language and lingua franca of Pakistan , where it is also an official language alongside English . In India , Urdu is an Eighth Schedule language , the status and cultural heritage of which are recognised by the Constitution of India ; and it also has an official status in several Indian states. In Nepal , Urdu

2640-668: Is a registered regional dialect and in South Africa , it is a protected language in the constitution. It is also spoken as a minority language in Afghanistan and Bangladesh , with no official status. Urdu and Hindi share a common Sanskrit - and Prakrit -derived vocabulary base, phonology , syntax , and grammar, making them mutually intelligible during colloquial communication . While formal Urdu draws literary, political, and technical vocabulary from Persian , formal Hindi draws these aspects from Sanskrit; consequently,

2750-494: Is not a communal demand as some people think but a stunt in order that the poor classes may not concentrate their thought and energies on all important questions of social and economic justice." It was a member of the All India Azad Muslim Conference , which gathered to show support for a united India. Syed Muhammad Kafeel Bukhari is present President Of Majlis Ahrar Islam Pakistan. In November 2012,

2860-527: Is not officially recognised by the Government of Bangladesh . The Urdu spoken by Stranded Pakistanis in Bangladesh is different from this dialect. Many bilingual or multi-lingual Urdu speakers, being familiar with both Urdu and English, display code-switching (referred to as " Urdish ") in certain localities and between certain social groups. On 14 August 2015, the Government of Pakistan launched

2970-488: Is one variety, is spoken much more widely, forming the third most commonly spoken language in the world, after Mandarin and English . The syntax (grammar), morphology , and the core vocabulary of Urdu and Hindi are essentially identical – thus linguists usually count them as one single language, while some contend that they are considered as two different languages for socio-political reasons. Owing to interaction with other languages, Urdu has become localised wherever it

3080-593: Is read and written as in other parts of India. A number of daily newspapers and several monthly magazines in Urdu are published in these states. Dhakaiya Urdu is a dialect native to the city of Old Dhaka in Bangladesh , dating back to the Mughal era . However, its popularity, even among native speakers, has been gradually declining since the Bengali Language Movement in the 20th century. It

3190-552: Is said to have arisen as the "language of the camp", or " Zaban-i-Ordu " means " Language of High camps " or natively " Lashkari Zaban " means " Language of Army " even though term Urdu held different meanings at that time. It is recorded that Aurangzeb spoke in Hindvi, which was most likely Persianized, as there are substantial evidence that Hindvi was written in the Persian script in this period. During this time period Urdu

3300-536: Is shared, though formal Urdu makes more use of the Persian "-e-" izafat grammatical construct (as in Hammam-e-Qadimi , or Nishan-e-Haider ) than does Hindi. The following table shows the number of Urdu speakers in some countries. Opposition to the partition of India Pashtun politician and Indian independence activist Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan of the Khudai Khidmatgar viewed

3410-729: Is spoken by large numbers of migrant South Asian workers in the major urban centres of the Persian Gulf countries. Urdu is also spoken by large numbers of immigrants and their children in the major urban centres of the United Kingdom , the United States, Canada, Germany, New Zealand, Norway, and Australia. Along with Arabic , Urdu is among the immigrant languages with the most speakers in Catalonia . Religious and social atmospheres in early nineteenth century India played

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3520-492: Is spoken, including in Pakistan. Urdu in Pakistan has undergone changes and has incorporated and borrowed many words from regional languages, thus allowing speakers of the language in Pakistan to distinguish themselves more easily and giving the language a decidedly Pakistani flavor. Similarly, the Urdu spoken in India can also be distinguished into many dialects such as the Standard Urdu of Lucknow and Delhi , as well as

3630-481: Is used in education , literature , office and court business, although in practice, English is used instead of Urdu in the higher echelons of government. Article 251(1) of the Pakistani Constitution mandates that Urdu be implemented as the sole language of government, though English continues to be the most widely used language at the higher echelons of Pakistani government. Urdu is also one of

3740-575: The Bombay , Bengal , Orissa , and Hyderabad State as well. Before independence, Muslim League leader Muhammad Ali Jinnah advocated the use of Urdu, which he used as a symbol of national cohesion in Pakistan. After the Bengali language movement and the separation of former East Pakistan , Urdu was recognised as the sole national language of Pakistan in 1973, although English and regional languages were also granted official recognition. Following

3850-671: The Central Hindi Directorate was established earlier in 1960, and the promotion of Hindi is better funded and more advanced, while the status of Urdu has been undermined by the promotion of Hindi. Private Indian organisations such as the Anjuman-e-Tariqqi Urdu, Deeni Talimi Council and Urdu Mushafiz Dasta promote the use and preservation of Urdu, with the Anjuman successfully launching a campaign that reintroduced Urdu as an official language of Bihar in

3960-631: The Christians of colonial India , along with Sikh political parties such as the Chief Khalsa Diwan and Shiromani Akali Dal led by Master Tara Singh condemned the call by separatists to create Pakistan, viewing it as a movement that would possibly persecute them. Frank Anthony , a Christian leader who served as the president of the All India Anglo-Indian Association cited several reasons for opposing

4070-687: The Dakhni ( Deccan ) of South India. Because of Urdu's similarity to Hindi , speakers of the two languages can easily understand one another if both sides refrain from using literary vocabulary. Although Urdu is widely spoken and understood throughout all of Pakistan, only 9% of Pakistan's population spoke Urdu according to the 2023 Pakistani census . Most of the nearly three million Afghan refugees of different ethnic origins (such as Pashtun , Tajik , Uzbek , Hazarvi , and Turkmen ) who stayed in Pakistan for over twenty-five years have also become fluent in Urdu. Muhajirs since 1947 have historically formed

4180-527: The Devanagari and Latin script ( Roman Urdu ) to allow its survival, or whether this will only hasten its demise and that the language can only be preserved if expressed in the Perso-Arabic script. For Pakistan, Willoughby & Aftab (2020) argued that Urdu originally had the image of a refined elite language of the Enlightenment, progress and emancipation, which contributed to the success of

4290-527: The Ilm Pakistan movement, with a uniform curriculum in Urdish. Ahsan Iqbal , Federal Minister of Pakistan, said "Now the government is working on a new curriculum to provide a new medium to the students which will be the combination of both Urdu and English and will name it Urdish." Standard Urdu is often compared with Standard Hindi . Both Urdu and Hindi, which are considered standard registers of

4400-610: The Khariboli dialect of the Delhi region). Dakhni (also known as Dakani, Deccani, Desia, Mirgan) is spoken in Deccan region of southern India . It is distinct by its mixture of vocabulary from Marathi and Konkani , as well as some vocabulary from Arabic, Persian and Chagatai that are not found in the standard dialect of Urdu. Dakhini is widely spoken in all parts of Maharashtra , Telangana , Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka . Urdu

4510-615: The New York Conference on Asian Studies on 9 October 2009 at Cornell University ; Yousaf stated that the partition of India itself was a result of the divide and rule policies of the British government that sought to create another buffer state between the Soviet Union and India to prevent the spread of Communism, as well the fact that a "division of the people and territory would prevent a united India from emerging as

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4620-482: The Punjabi elite of Pakistan, have adopted Urdu as a mother tongue and identify with both an Urdu speaker as well as Punjabi identity. Urdu was chosen as a symbol of unity for the new state of Pakistan in 1947, because it had already served as a lingua franca among Muslims in north and northwest British India . It is written, spoken and used in all provinces/territories of Pakistan , and together with English as

4730-543: The Université de Montréal ), has stated that the malaise and sectarian violence within South Asia is a consequence of the partition of India, which took place without a referendum in pre-1947 colonial India; these professors have stated that "Inhabitants of the subcontinent of India are poignantly reminded at this moment of the grave injustice that was done to them in 1947, when British India was partitioned without taking

4840-399: The de jure legal status and de facto political status of Urdu, how much Urdu is used as language of instruction and chosen by students in higher education, and how the maintenance and development of Urdu is financially and institutionally supported by governments and NGOs. In India, although Urdu is not and never was used exclusively by Muslims (and Hindi never exclusively by Hindus),

4950-547: The 18th century and two similar standard forms came into existence in Delhi and Lucknow . Since the partition of India in 1947, a third standard has arisen in the Pakistani city of Karachi . Deccani , an older form used in southern India , became a court language of the Deccan sultanates by the 16th century. Urdu has a few recognised dialects, including Dakhni , Dhakaiya , Rekhta , and Modern Vernacular Urdu (based on

5060-483: The 1950s (particularly those in East Pakistan , where Bengali was the dominant language), challenged the idea of Urdu as a national symbol and its practicality as the lingua franca . The significance of Urdu as a national symbol was downplayed by these disputes when English and Bengali were also accepted as official languages in the former East Pakistan (now Bangladesh ). Urdu is the sole national, and one of

5170-479: The 1960s, the Urdu lobby and eventually the Urdu language in Pakistan has been associated with religious Islamism and political national conservatism (and eventually the lower and lower-middle classes, alongside regional languages such as Punjabi, Sindhi, and Balochi), while English has been associated with the internationally oriented secular and progressive left (and eventually the upper and upper-middle classes). Despite governmental attempts at Urduisation of Pakistan,

5280-718: The 1970s. In the former Jammu and Kashmir state , section 145 of the Kashmir Constitution stated: "The official language of the State shall be Urdu but the English language shall unless the Legislature by law otherwise provides, continue to be used for all the official purposes of the State for which it was being used immediately before the commencement of the Constitution." Urdu became a literary language in

5390-690: The 1979 Soviet Invasion of Afghanistan and subsequent arrival of millions of Afghan refugees who have lived in Pakistan for many decades, many Afghans, including those who moved back to Afghanistan, have also become fluent in Hindi-Urdu, an occurrence aided by exposure to the Indian media, chiefly Hindi-Urdu Bollywood films and songs. There have been attempts to purge Urdu of native Prakrit and Sanskrit words, and Hindi of Persian loanwords – new vocabulary draws primarily from Persian and Arabic for Urdu and from Sanskrit for Hindi. English has exerted

5500-489: The All India Muslim League would cause the balkanization of India that would lead to "potentially ‘emasculating’ India" as a global leader. Anthony stated that India was unlike Europe in that “India had achieved a basic ethnic and cultural unity.” Lastly, Anthony held that “the division of India would lead to war between the two countries” and give rise to the spread of extremist ideologies. Critics of

5610-550: The British agenda." All of Hindustan, according to Mashriqi, belonged to Indian Muslims. In 1941, a CID report states that thousands of Muslim weavers under the banner of Momin Conference and coming from Bihar and Eastern U.P. descended in Delhi demonstrating against the proposed two-nation theory. A gathering of more than fifty thousand people from an unorganized sector was not usual at that time, so its importance should be duly recognized. The non- ashraf Muslims constituting

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5720-530: The British rule. This party, before fading away, was highly active in Punjab Province (British India) and left an impact on major cities of Punjab like Amritsar , Lahore , Sialkot , Multan , Ludhiana and Gurdaspur . The Majlis-e-Ahrar-e-Islam, was originally part of the failed Khilafat movement and emerged as a religio-political party after the Jallianwala Bagh massacre of 1919 and

5830-461: The British secret police, organised massacre of Musulmans in Hindustan, and of Hindus and Sikhs in Pakistan. Fratricidal clashes in Hindustan and Pakistan were handy to British imperialism and its agents. The partition of India was effected with a view to maintain political and economic domination of British imperialism in the country divided into parts. ... The partition of India was accomplished by

5940-562: The British. Yousaf holds that "Muhammad Ali Jinnah, the President of the All-India Muslim League and later founder of Pakistan, had been misleading the Muslim community in order to go down in history as the saviour of the Muslim cause and to become founder and first Governor General of Pakistan." Allama Mashriqi, a nationalist Muslim, thus saw Jinnah as "becoming a tool in British hands for his political career." Besides

6050-594: The Capital was relocated to Delhi and named Shahjahanabad and the Bazar of the town was named Urdu e Muallah. In the Akbar era the word Rekhta was used to describe Urdu for the first time. It was originally a Persian word that meant "to create a mixture". Amir Khusrau was the first person to use the same word for Poetry. Before the standardisation of Urdu into colonial administration, British officers often referred to

6160-707: The Conservative Party supported the plan of partitioning India, proposed by the Labour Government. This testifies to the fact that the whole of this plan is a British imperialist plan and corresponds with its interests and its calculations. It is not without reasons that during the debate on the Bill in the British House of Commons and the House of Lords, the leaders of the Conservative Party greeted

6270-465: The Delhi region of India the native language was Khariboli , whose earliest form is known as Old Hindi (or Hindavi). It belongs to the Western Hindi group of the Central Indo-Aryan languages. The contact of Hindu and Muslim cultures during the period of Islamic conquests in the Indian subcontinent (12th to 16th centuries) led to the development of Hindustani as a product of a composite Ganga-Jamuni tehzeeb . In cities such as Delhi,

6380-426: The English liked to use the name "Moors" for Urdu: I have a deep knowledge [ je possède à fond ] of the common tongue of India, called Moors by the English, and Ourdouzebain by the natives of the land. Several works of Sufi writers like Ashraf Jahangir Semnani used similar names for the Urdu language. Shah Abdul Qadir Raipuri was the first person who translated The Quran into Urdu. During Shahjahan's time,

6490-617: The Government of Pakistan banned Abdul Latif Khalid Cheema, leader of Tehreek-e-Khatme Nabuwwat and Secretary General of Majlis-e-Ahrar-e-Islam, from delivering a speech in the Chichawatni and district Sahiwal area due to the security situation in Muharram . In Pakistan, the party opposed the Ahmadiyya Movement . This culminated in the 1953 Lahore riots ; in 1954, Majlis-e-Ahrar was banned. The associated Islamist religious movement Tehreek-e-Khatme Nabuwwat remains. Urdu language Urdu ( / ˈ ʊər d uː / ; اُردُو , pronounced [ʊɾduː] , ALA-LC : Urdū )

6600-417: The Government's plan as one which came to the rescue of the British imperialism, and the Labour Government as the loyal defender of the interests of the British Empire. Having divided India and conferred on Hindustan and Pakistan “the title of dominion”, British imperialism there by maintained its colonial domination over India. British capital fully and completely as in the past occupies a commanding position in

6710-420: The Heathens, or from the Persians, or other Nations. In 1715, a complete literary Diwan in Rekhta was written by Nawab Sadruddin Khan . An Urdu-Persian dictionary was written by Khan-i Arzu in 1751 in the reign of Ahmad Shah Bahadur . The name Urdu was first introduced by the poet Ghulam Hamadani Mushafi around 1780. As a literary language, Urdu took shape in courtly, elite settings. While Urdu retained

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6820-405: The Indian government do not actively support the preservation of Urdu in professional and official spaces. Because the Pakistani government proclaimed Urdu the national language at Partition, the Indian state and some religious nationalists began in part to regard Urdu as a 'foreign' language, to be viewed with suspicion. Urdu advocates in India disagree whether it should be allowed to write Urdu in

6930-413: The Labour Government which is more supple and more capable of making use of social and national demagogy, than the previous Conservative Government. It was easier for the Labour Party to accomplish this manoeuvre because the leaders of the Indian National Congress had always been maintaining with them a certain contract and more willingly came to a compromise with the Labour Cabinet. It is characteristic that

7040-498: The Pakistan independence movement. After 1947, it separated into the Majlis-E-Ahrar Islam Hind (مجلس احرارلأسلام ہند), based in Ludhiana and led by descendants of Maulana Habib-ur-Rehman Ludhianvi , as well as the Majlis-e-Ahrar-e-Islam (مجلس احرارلأسلام اسلام), based in Lahore and led by descendants of Syed Ata Ullah Shah Bukhari . Majlis-e-Ahrar-ul-Islam or simply called 'Ahrars' had an anti-imperialist, anti-feudal and Indian nationalist ideology. It worked to free India from

7150-445: The absorption of vocabulary from various regional Pakistani languages, while some Urdu vocabularies has also been assimilated by Pakistan's regional languages. Some who are from a non-Urdu background now can read and write only Urdu. With such a large number of people(s) speaking Urdu, the language has acquired a peculiar Pakistani flavor further distinguishing it from the Urdu spoken by native speakers, resulting in more diversity within

7260-407: The ancient language Old Hindi began to acquire many Persian loanwords and continued to be called "Hindi" and later, also "Hindustani". An early literary tradition of Hindavi was founded by Amir Khusrau in the late 13th century. After the conquest of the Deccan , and a subsequent immigration of noble Muslim families into the south, a form of the language flourished in medieval India as

7370-412: The court language of various Indo-Islamic empires . Religious, social, and political factors arose during the European colonial period that advocated a distinction between Urdu and Hindi, leading to the Hindi–Urdu controversy . According to 2022 estimates by Ethnologue and The World Factbook , produced by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), Urdu is the 10th-most widely spoken language in

7480-402: The disintegration of the Khilafat movement in 1922. Syed Ata Ullah Shah Bukhari presided over the meeting and Maulana Mazhar Ali Azhar delivered the manifesto of an All India Majlis-e-Ahrar-e-Islam. It became first line offending party against Ahmadi Muslims by declaring that their objectives were to guide the Muslims of India on matters of nationalism as well as religion. Ahrar spearheaded

7590-415: The early 21st century an increasing percentage of Indian Muslims began switching to Hindi due to socio-economic factors, such as Urdu being abandoned as the language of instruction in much of India, and having limited employment opportunities compared to Hindi, English and regional languages. The number of Urdu speakers in India fell 1.5% between 2001 and 2011 (then 5.08 million Urdu speakers), especially in

7700-479: The economy of Hindustan and Pakistan. A powerful lever of the colonial exploitation of India is the banking system. All the big banks in India, with the exception of two, are managed by British monopolists. Thus they are holding in their hands the largest amount of capital which they can invest in industries, Railways, Ports etc. Indian industry is fully dependent on the British bankers. More than half of jute and tea industry of Hindustan, 1/3rd of iron and steel industry,

7810-414: The exalted camp . Earlier it was known as Hindvi, Hindi and Hindustani . Urdu, like Hindi , is a form of Hindustani language . Some linguists have suggested that the earliest forms of Urdu evolved from the medieval (6th to 13th century) Apabhraṃśa register of the preceding Shauraseni language , a Middle Indo-Aryan language that is also the ancestor of other modern Indo-Aryan languages. In

7920-412: The founders of the party. The Ahrar was composed of Indian Muslims disillusioned by the Khilafat Movement , which cleaved closer to the Congress Party . The party, being a member of the All India Azad Muslim Conference , is associated with opposition to Muhammad Ali Jinnah and establishment of an independent Pakistan. Syed Faiz-ul Hassan Shah was the only ahrari leader who actively participated in

8030-529: The grammar and core Indo-Aryan vocabulary of the local Indian dialect Khariboli, it adopted the Nastaleeq writing system – which was developed as a style of Persian calligraphy. Throughout the history of the language, Urdu has been referred to by several other names: Hindi, Hindavi, Rekhta, Urdu-e-Muallah, Dakhini , Moors and Dehlavi . In 1773, the Swiss French soldier Antoine Polier notes that

8140-480: The independence movement. But after the 1947 Partition , when it was chosen as the national language of Pakistan to unite all inhabitants with one linguistic identity, it faced serious competition primarily from Bengali (spoken by 56% of the total population, mostly in East Pakistan until that attained independence in 1971 as Bangladesh ), and after 1971 from English. Both pro-independence elites that formed

8250-554: The language as " Moors " or "Moorish jargon". John Gilchrist was the first in British India to begin a systematic study on Urdu and began to use the term "Hindustani" what the majority of Europeans called "Moors", authoring the book The Strangers's East Indian Guide to the Hindoostanee or Grand Popular Language of India (improperly Called Moors) . Urdu was then promoted in colonial India by British policies to counter

8360-458: The language in the Perso-Arabic script in courts and government offices, though Hindus continued to employ the Devanagari script in certain literary and religious contexts. Through the late 19th century, people did not view Urdu and Hindi as being two distinct languages, though in urban areas, the standardised Hindustani language was increasingly being referred to as Urdu and written in the Perso-Arabic script. Urdu and English replaced Persian as

8470-575: The language of Bollywood films tend to contain a large number of Persian and Arabic words and thus considered to be "Urdu" in a sense, especially in songs. India has more than 3,000 Urdu publications, including 405 daily Urdu newspapers. Newspapers such as Neshat News Urdu , Sahara Urdu , Daily Salar , Hindustan Express , Daily Pasban , Siasat Daily , The Munsif Daily and Inqilab are published and distributed in Bangalore, Malegaon, Mysore, Hyderabad, and Mumbai . Outside South Asia, it

8580-883: The language. In India, Urdu is spoken in places where there are large Muslim minorities or cities that were bases for Muslim empires in the past. These include parts of Uttar Pradesh , Madhya Pradesh , Bihar , Telangana , Andhra Pradesh , Maharashtra ( Marathwada and Konkanis), Karnataka and cities such as Hyderabad , Lucknow , Delhi , Malerkotla , Bareilly , Meerut , Saharanpur , Muzaffarnagar , Roorkee , Deoband , Moradabad , Azamgarh , Bijnor , Najibabad , Rampur , Aligarh , Allahabad , Gorakhpur , Agra , Firozabad , Kanpur , Badaun , Bhopal , Hyderabad , Aurangabad , Bangalore , Kolkata , Mysore , Patna , Darbhanga , Gaya , Madhubani , Samastipur , Siwan , Saharsa , Supaul , Muzaffarpur , Nalanda , Munger , Bhagalpur , Araria , Gulbarga , Parbhani , Nanded , Malegaon , Bidar , Ajmer , and Ahmedabad . In

8690-641: The leadership of the Muslim League in Pakistan and the Hindu-dominated Congress Party in India had been educated in English during the British colonial period, and continued to operate in English and send their children to English-medium schools as they continued dominate both countries' post-Partition politics. Although the Anglicized elite in Pakistan has made attempts at Urduisation of education with varying degrees of success, no successful attempts were ever made to Urduise politics,

8800-466: The legal system, the army, or the economy, all of which remained solidly Anglophone. Even the regime of general Zia-ul-Haq (1977–1988), who came from a middle-class Punjabi family and initially fervently supported a rapid and complete Urduisation of Pakistani society (earning him the honorary title of the 'Patron of Urdu' in 1981), failed to make significant achievements, and by 1987 had abandoned most of his efforts in favour of pro-English policies. Since

8910-404: The main languages of instruction, although the people from differing provinces may have different native languages. 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

9020-471: The mainstream political developments of British India between 1931 and 1947. Its political career can be divided into two parts; the AHRAR's response to political and constitutional issues, and its performance in electoral politics. The Majlis-e-Ahrar-ul-Islam stood strongly against the partition of India , with its leader Afzal Haq stating that the "Partition of India is, in fact, the cry of upper classes …. It

9130-457: The majority population in the city of Karachi , however. Many newspapers are published in Urdu in Pakistan, including the Daily Jang , Nawa-i-Waqt , and Millat . No region in Pakistan uses Urdu as its mother tongue, though it is spoken as the first language of Muslim migrants (known as Muhajirs ) in Pakistan who left India after independence in 1947. Other communities, most notably

9240-403: The most Urdu-speaking states of Uttar Pradesh (c. 8% to 5%) and Bihar (c. 11.5% to 8.5%), even though the number of Muslims in these two states grew in the same period. Although Urdu is still very prominent in early 21st-century Indian pop culture, ranging from Bollywood to social media, knowledge of the Urdu script and the publication of books in Urdu have steadily declined, while policies of

9350-564: The most alive language and moving ahead with times" in India. This phenomenon pertains to the decrease in relative and absolute numbers of native Urdu speakers as opposed to speakers of other languages; declining (advanced) knowledge of Urdu's Perso-Arabic script, Urdu vocabulary and grammar; the role of translation and transliteration of literature from and into Urdu; the shifting cultural image of Urdu and socio-economic status associated with Urdu speakers (which negatively impacts especially their employment opportunities in both countries),

9460-579: The movement to have Ahmadi Muslims officially declared as non-Muslims. By the early 1930s, the Majlis-e-Ahrar-e-Islam (hereafter called Ahrars) had become an important political party of Muslims in the Punjab . The activists' agitation centered on the princely states, and was predicated on mobilisation around socio-religious issues. Besides these campaigns, the Ahrar also participated in

9570-461: The official languages in northern parts of India in 1837. In colonial Indian Islamic schools, Muslims were taught Persian and Arabic as the languages of Indo-Islamic civilisation ; the British, in order to promote literacy among Indian Muslims and attract them to attend government schools, started to teach Urdu written in the Perso-Arabic script in these governmental educational institutions and after this time, Urdu began to be seen by Indian Muslims as

9680-526: The officially recognised languages in India and also has the status of "additional official language" in the Indian states of Andhra Pradesh , Uttar Pradesh , Bihar , Jharkhand , West Bengal , Telangana and the national capital territory Delhi . Also as one of the five official languages of Jammu and Kashmir . India established the governmental Bureau for the Promotion of Urdu in 1969, although

9790-438: The ongoing Hindi–Urdu controversy and modern cultural association of each language with the two religions has led to fewer Hindus using Urdu. In the 20th century, Indian Muslims gradually began to collectively embrace Urdu (for example, 'post-independence Muslim politics of Bihar saw a mobilisation around the Urdu language as tool of empowerment for minorities especially coming from weaker socio-economic backgrounds' ), but in

9900-410: The other hand, give Britain a foothold in India. A state dominated by the Muslim League would offer a permanent sphere of influence to the British. This was also bound to influence the attitude of India. With a British base in Pakistan, India would have to pay far greater attention to British interests than she might otherwise do. ... The partition of India would materially alter the situation in favour of

10010-417: The partition of India argue that an undivided India would have boasted one of the strongest armies in the world, had more competitive sports teams, fostered an increased protection of minorities with religious harmony , championed greater women's rights , possessed extended maritime borders, projected elevated soft power , and offered a "focus on education and health instead of the defence sector". Pakistan

10120-400: The partition of India. If India were to be divided, the regions proposed to become Pakistan would still contain a “considerable number of non-Muslims, and a large number of Muslims would also remain in [independent] India" thus rendering the partition to be useless. Furthermore, the partition of India would jeopardise the interests of the minority communities. He held that the plan proposed by

10230-518: The position and prestige of English only grew stronger in the meantime. There are over 100 million native speakers of Urdu in India and Pakistan together: there were 50.8 million Urdu speakers in India (4.34% of the total population) as per the 2011 census; and approximately 16 million in Pakistan in 2006. There are several hundred thousand in the United Kingdom, Saudi Arabia, United States, and Bangladesh . However, Hindustani, of which Urdu

10340-484: The previous emphasis on Persian. In colonial India, "ordinary Muslims and Hindus alike spoke the same language in the United Provinces in the nineteenth century, namely Hindustani, whether called by that name or whether called Hindi, Urdu, or one of the regional dialects such as Braj or Awadhi ." Elites from Muslim communities, as well as a minority of Hindu elites, such as Munshis of Hindu origin, wrote

10450-498: The pro-separatist Muslim League, Islamic leadership in British India rejected the notion of partitioning the country, exemplified by the fact that most Muslims in the heartland of the subcontinent remained where they were, rather than migrating to newly created state of Pakistan. India and Pakistan are currently allocating a significant amount of their budget into military spending—money that could be spent in economic and social development. Poverty, homelessness, illiteracy, terrorism and

10560-478: The proposal to partition India as un-Islamic and contradicting a common history in which Muslims considered India as their homeland for over a millennium. Mahatma Gandhi opined that "Hindus and Muslims were sons of the same soil of India; they were brothers who therefore must strive to keep India free and united." Sunni Muslims of the Deobandi school of thought regarded the proposed partition and formation of

10670-646: The same language, Hindustani (or Hindi-Urdu), share a core vocabulary and grammar . Apart from religious associations, the differences are largely restricted to the standard forms : Standard Urdu is conventionally written in the Nastaliq style of the Persian alphabet and relies heavily on Persian and Arabic as a source for technical and literary vocabulary, whereas Standard Hindi is conventionally written in Devanāgarī and draws on Sanskrit . However, both share

10780-583: The style of Urdu spoken on a day-to-day basis in Pakistan is akin to neutral Hindustani that serves as the lingua franca of the northern Indian subcontinent. Since at least 1977, some commentators such as journalist Khushwant Singh have characterised Urdu as a "dying language", though others, such as Indian poet and writer Gulzar (who is popular in both countries and both language communities, but writes only in Urdu (script) and has difficulties reading Devanagari, so he lets others 'transcribe' his work) have disagreed with this assessment and state that Urdu "is

10890-618: The two languages' mutual intelligibility effectively decreases as the factor of formality increases. Urdu originated in the area of the Ganges-Yamuna Doab , though significant development occurred in the Deccan Plateau . In 1837, Urdu became an official language of the British East India Company , replacing Persian across northern India during Company rule ; Persian had until this point served as

11000-425: The two official languages of Pakistan (along with English). It is spoken and understood throughout the country, whereas the state-by-state languages (languages spoken throughout various regions) are the provincial languages , although only 7.57% of Pakistanis speak Urdu as their first language. Its official status has meant that Urdu is understood and spoken widely throughout Pakistan as a second or third language. It

11110-518: The view that it was a mistake. Because of the fear of the peasant revolution, the leaders of the Muslim League in full agreement with British imperialism favoured the partition of India and maintenance of British domination. They demanded formation of the Muslim State, by kindling religious animosity between the Hindus and the Muslims. ... The partition of India could not solve and did not solve

11220-428: The whole mineral output, rubber plantations etc. belong to British capital. The subject of undoing the partition and reunifying India has been discussed by both Indians and Pakistanis. In The Nation , Kashmiri Indian politician Markandey Katju has advocated the reunification of India with Pakistan under a secular government. He stated that the cause of the partition was the divide and rule policy of Britain, which

11330-475: The wishes of its inhabitants into account." Sharma, Cox, Ahmad and Singh further wrote that "We regret that the fate of a quarter of the population of the globe was decided arbitrarily by the representative of an imperial power and by those who were not even duly elected by adult franchise." As such, Sharma, Cox, Ahmad and Singh in The New York Times in 1992 demanded that "a plebiscite be held over

11440-455: The world , with 230 million total speakers, including those who speak it as a second language . The name Urdu was first used by the poet Ghulam Hamadani Mushafi around 1780 for Hindustani language even though he himself also used Hindavi term in his poetry to define the language. Ordu means army in the Turkic languages . In late 18th century, it was known as Zaban-e-Urdu-e-Mualla زبانِ اُرْدُوئے مُعَلّٰی means language of

11550-520: Was based in Punjab and gathered support from the urban lower-middle class. Chaudhry Afzal Haq , Maulana Habib-ur-Rehman Ludhianvi , and Syed Ata Ullah Shah Bukhari were the leaders of the party. Religious leaders from all sects Sunni Barelvi , Deobandi , Ahle Hadith , Shia Progressive and politically Communists were the members of Majlis-e-Ahrar. Chaudhry Afzal Haq , Syed Ata Ullah Shah Bukhari , Habib-ur-Rehman Ludhianvi , Mazhar Ali Azhar , Maulana Zafar Ali Khan and Dawood Ghaznavi were

11660-429: Was created through the partition of India on the basis of religious segregation ; the very concept of dividing the country of India has criticized for its implication "that people with different backgrounds" cannot live together. After it occurred, critics of the partition of India point to the displacement of fifteen million people, the murder of more than one million people, and the rape of 75,000 women to demonstrate

11770-751: Was designed to keep Muslims backward. They also expected "Muslim-majority provinces in united India to be more effective than the rulers of independent Pakistan in helping the Muslim minorities living in Hindu-majority areas." Deobandis pointed to the Treaty of Hudaybiyyah , which was made between the Muslims and Qureysh of Mecca, that "promoted mutual interaction between the two communities thus allowing more opportunities for Muslims to preach their religion to Qureysh through peaceful tabligh ." Deobandi Sunni scholar Sayyid Husain Ahmad Madani argued for

11880-495: Was implemented to spread communal hatred after Britain saw that Hindus and Muslims worked together to agitate against their colonial rule in India. Katju serves as the chairman of the Indian Reunification Association (IRA), which seeks to campaign for this cause. Pakistani historian Nasim Yousaf, the grandson of Allama Mashriqi , has also championed Indian Reunification and presented the idea at

11990-556: Was intentioned as means of unification for Muslims in Northern India and later Pakistan, it adopted a modified Perso-Arabic script. Urdu continued its role in developing a Pakistani identity as the Islamic Republic of Pakistan was established with the intent to construct a homeland for the Muslims of Colonial India. Several languages and dialects spoken throughout the regions of Pakistan produced an imminent need for

12100-555: Was referred to as "Moors", which simply meant Muslim, by European writers. John Ovington wrote in 1689: The language of the Moors is different from that of the ancient original inhabitants of India but is obliged to these Gentiles for its characters. For though the Moors dialect is peculiar to themselves, yet it is destitute of Letters to express it; and therefore, in all their Writings in their Mother Tongue, they borrow their letters from

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