Language has many uses as a means of communication, an instrument of transmitting knowledge, an expression of cultural and creative urges of a community. However, languages do not originate overnight, they take centuries to evolve and develop.
Urdu is the national and one of the two official languages of Pakistan, the other being English, and is spoken and understood throughout the country. Urdu by itself is the twentieth most popular 'first' language in the world.
Urdu was created around the 1600’s in Central Asia. The word "URDU" comes from the Turkish word ‘ordu’ and it means "an army or legion". It was used as a unifying communication tool between the Muslim soldiers during their conquest of Ancient India and Eastern Persia. These soldiers were of Persian, Arab, or Turkish descent.
Urdu is written from right to left just like Arabic and Persian. Urdu has thirty nine basic letters and thirteen extra characters, all together fifty two. Most of these letters are from Arabic and a small quantity from Persian. It has almost all the 'sounds' available in any other language spoken in the world.
Due to its emphasis on politeness and propriety, Urdu has always been considered an elevated, somewhat aristocratic, language in South Asia.
The exact origin of Urdu is somewhat difficult to trace; but many different theories have been developed to explain it. There are different views on the origins of Urdu, differing in both time and geographic location.
Mohammad Hussain Azad, an eminent Indian scholar, believes that Brij Bhasha, a dialect of Western Hindi, is the mother language of Urdu. Azad imagines that the mother of Urdu is simple, sweet, natural, and entirely Indian.
Mehmud Sherani, on the contrary, maintains that Urdu language originated due to the interaction and intermixing of Muslim soldiers with the local Hindus after the conquest of Punjab and Sindh by Mehmud of Ghazni. According to him, during this era many Punjabi words and idioms got interwoven in Hindi of Delhi and thus a new language came into being.
The most established theory relating the origin, evolution and development of Urdu language is that Urdu is a conglomeration of many different languages mainly Arabic, Persian, Turkish, Pashtu, Hindi and some local dialects of India.
It is a member of the Hindustani group of languages, which is a subgroup of the Indo Aryan group, which is in turn part of the Indo European family of languages. Urdu is related to most of the languages of India and northern South Asia, as all of them have analogous grammatical structures and a certain common vocabulary.
The language as we now know it had not come into existence during this period. Instead it was a product of the dialect used by the Muslims who ruled over India from the 14th century onwards. The literary speech arising out of it, known as Dakhni may be traced back to the 15th century. Modern Urdu has taken almost nine hundred years to develop to its present form.
The result was what has been considered by some to be one of the world's most beautiful languages, the "Kohinoor" of India. It is widely spoken today in both India and Pakistan and all countries having a sizeable South Asian Diaspora.
The language of the Muslims of Central and Southern Asia was Persian for the time between 1000 CE and 1700 CE. After the 1700’s, Persian saw a setback as Urdu gradually emerged as the dominating force. Urdu could be considered as a derivative of Persian as its vocabulary remained over seventy percent Farsi.
Muslims ruled over India for about one thousand years. Muslim army comprised of soldiers of different origins and nationalities speaking different languages. It was the interaction among these soldiers and with the locals that led to the development of a new language, mutually understood by all.
Upon the initial years of its birth, Urdu was only used as a communication lingo. This hybrid language was called ‘Hindvi’ or ‘Dehlvi’ and was written in ‘Devnagri’ Script.
Later on in 14th century when this language was introduced in Southern India, the vocabulary of Hindvi expanded as many words and idioms of local languages were embedded. People start calling this new version of language as ‘Dakhni’.
The expansion of vocabulary continued and it changed from ‘Dakhni’ to ‘Rekhta’. Rekhta is believed to be the forerunner of modern Urdu language. The standardization of Rekhta took place in the sixteenth and seventeenth century during the reign of Shah Jehan and Aurangzeb Alamgir, when synthetic character of Urdu acquired a complete form and greater content and power.
The fall of the Urdu language began in the late 1800’s. Coincidentally it was the same time when the Muslims lost control of the region to the British after ruling India for over twelve hundred years. The imperialist power gave great importance to the spread of their language English and chose Hindustani as the medium language for the average man.
Hindustani was the language mixed between Urdu and Hindi (with the scale slanted towards the latter). It was used as a tool to merge the Hindus and the Muslims into a single identity, servants of Britain. At this point the leaders and educated among the Muslims knew that if they didn’t create their own state, they would soon be “Indianized” and lose their religion and culture. They perceived it as a loss of identity.
Urdu was the premiere language of poetry in India for two centuries and has a large and rich collection of poetry in a host of different poetic forms. The Ghazal is a form of poetry that was used extensively by poets all over South Asia. Nevertheless its beauty and grace has made it well liked by people from all faiths all over the region. Mir, Ghalib, Faiz and Haali are some of the premiere poets in the genre of Ghazal.
In addition to Ghazal, the poetic forms of Rubai, Masnavi, Qaseeda, Geet, Marsia, Shehr aashob, Doha and Nauha are very well developed in Urdu. Foreign forms such as Sonnet and Haiku have also been used by Urdu poets, mainly in the modern era.
Amir Khusro (1253-1325) a remarkable scholar of Persian and Arabic is considered to be the first ever poet of Urdu language. He composed his poems in the then prevailing ‘Hindvi’ language. Wali Deccani (1635-1707) and Quli Qutab Shah are believed to be the predecessors of Amir Khusro.
One of Quli Qutab Shah’s courtiers wrote a romantic poem whose theme was the love of a king, rather than a prince, for a Telegu Hindu girl named Bhagwati whom he later married. He named the city built in her honor as Bhag-nagar and subsequently renamed with her Islamic name Haider-Begum. This became the city of Hyderabad.
In the late 1400 and early 1500, under the patronage of the Mughals, modern Urdu started taking shape to be used in poetry, prose and plays. Mughal emperor Bahadur Shah Zafar is also highly esteemed among Urdu poets because of his unique style. Amongst the poets of 19th century Allama Mohamad Iqbal (1877-1938) stands out, because he was the first one who introduced revolutionary concepts and ideas in his poetry.
Great poets such as Zauq and Sauda apart from Mir, Ghalib, and Haali made the language acceptable as a literary medium. The increasing quantity of poetry and literature caused the language to become more uniform and less volatile than it had been in the past.
Mirza Asad Ullah Khan Galib (1797-1869) is the finest poet of Urdu language.
He was a specialized Ghazal poet and his work is still popular among the masses.
Faiz Ahmad Faiz is the most well-known and a distinguished poet of modern era. His work revolves around the concepts of communism and social justice.
The short story in Urdu began with Munshi Premchand’s ‘Soz-e-Vatan’. Mohammad Hasan Askari, Sajjad Zaheer, Saddat Hassan Manto, Mumtaz Muffati, and Ashafaq Ahmad are just a few names that are counted among leading lights of Urdu short story.
Novel writing in Urdu can be traced to Nazir Ahmed (1836-1912) who composed several novels like Mirat-ul-Urus, Banat-un-Nash and Taubat-un-Nasuh.
Realism in Urdu novel was introduced by PremChand. Mirza Mohamad Hadi Ruswa, Niaz Fateh Puri, and Abdul Haleem Sharar are among the few pioneers excelling in Urdu novels. Urdu novelists of modern times include Intizar Hussain and Bano Qudssiya.
Akbar Allahabadi (1846-1921) was the pioneer among the Urdu humorists and satirists. Majeed Lahori, Mehdi Ali Khan, Shafiq-ur-Rahman, Ibn-e-Insha, Mushfiq Khwaja, Mushtaq Ahmed Yousifi, Mujtaba Hussain, Himayatullah and Talib Khundmeri are the other leading names in the field of humour.
Even though Urdu has been used as a language for literature for a short period of time, a varied and extensive literature of the language has come up. A large number of volumes of Islamic works are present in Urdu. Two genres have seen a lot of development in Urdu. The Daastaan is a long story which includes multiple story lines and plots. Though it does not have any particular focus, it has the usage of beautiful linguistic structures. However, it is not used any more.
The Afsaana is a short story. It has come to become the primary genre of Urdu literature. The most well known Afsana writers or Afsana Nigaar in Urdu are Saadat Hasan Manto, Ahmed Nadeem Qasmi, Munshi Premchand and Krishan Chander. Munshi Premchand, a Hindu writer, became known as a pioneer in the Afsana. He showed that religion was not a bar to Urdu's grand capacity to express.
It was in the first half of the nineteenth century that drama started appearing at Urdu scene. The first dramatist is believed to be Amant Lucknowi, and his drama Indar Sabha is considered as the first Urdu drama. Urdu drama has made a lot of progress in recent years. Agha Hashar Kashmiri, Amjad Islam Amjad, Haseena Moin, Fatim Suriya Bajiha are the most distinguished play writers of present day.
The most renowned Urdu literature is written by Mirza Assadullah Ghalib and Allama Iqbal and their works are read until today.
Urdu as is used in Pakistan in current times has departed greatly from the literary form used by the educated and commoners of the past. Pakistan was built on firm grounds with Urdu to remain as the language of prestige and greatest articulacy. In current times, however, Urdu is seen as a language too complicated to learn by younger generations and has stepped into the background. People would rather prefer English as taught in their schools or the Hindustani that they hear on Hindi films.
A famous Arab scholar once said, “The one who adapts and replaces his customs for another’s is indeed the defeated.”
Bollywood has played a great part in the downfall of the Urdu language. Indians have adapted Urdu for many of their songs, believing that Urdu is the superior eloquent language of the subcontinent. Even though less than five percent of their population speaks what they call Urdu; they still feel the need to develop their songs in the Muslim’s language.
It plays as a snare for the Pakistanis; they would watch them believing they use Urdu but eventually they would end up adapting a plethora of Hindi vocabulary in the midst. Instead of reading and learning the language and concepts of the Quran, Urdu poetry of olden times, or the sciences, they decide to spend three hours everyday to be influenced by a Hindi movie. Indeed, a detriment to their modesty, brain, religion, and tongue.
Uncertainty encompasses the future of the language and if events continue in the same path they are currently headed, Urdu will soon be forgotten. The term, Urdu, may remain in use but to refer to a language almost completely different from what it was before. It would be more appropriate to label it as an English or Hindi derivative.
The future lies in the hands of the government of Pakistan and ministers in charge of education and law. Classical Urdu should be compulsory to all students along with some knowledge of Arabic.
Religious schools should be used as educational institutions through which Pakistan can raise their literacy rates. Just by having the ability to read the script from the Qur’an, people will be literate to some extent to read Urdu as well. Proper organization with a system of teaching in each Masjid will enable the country to become civilized.
Perhaps one day people shall realize the need and make the initiative. Until then it is up to individuals to educate about a language that is on the verge of being forgotten
