By Zeeshan Khan
The progress of any country and the nation breathing free in it depends on its civilization, culture, and social order. To nurture it and to prove unity, the whole nation has to become one voice and pave the way for progress, and in this regard, the importance of the “national language” cannot be denied.
Today’s young generation, which has to take over the reins of the country and nation tomorrow and highlight the national identity among the nations of the world on the strength of its abilities, seems oblivious to what the importance of the national language is. Perhaps, the fault also lies with those individuals whom we know as the bureaucracy, who by giving priority to a foreign language over the national language have put the country and nation into a new test.
The English language has now become a strong and invincible part of our curriculum, our teaching, and our system of government, although on the foundations on which the country was achieved, Urdu was chosen as the national language and it was also decided that within the next twenty years all laws, rules, policies and regulations in force in the country would be promulgated in this language.
However, it is a separate tragedy that the Constitution of Pakistan itself is written in English, from which one can gauge how influenced the nation, and especially the bureaucracy, is by the English language. It is also being said that now that clause has also been deleted from the Constitution according to which Urdu was to be enforced at the official level as the national language and under the same language the office language of all government departments was also to be brought into routine.
Well, this is a separate debate and dispute for which there is a dire need of a think tank. The real thing to think and understand here is why the national language has been given second-rate importance, and why its speaking, writing and office use is frowned upon, and why its usefulness and importance is denied. Are those who speak Urdu in the world considered deprived of progress, or are those who speak and understand Urdu less knowledgeable, or are those who have command over the English language considered respectable people of the world? From observations and the opinions of experts, it has been found that the English language has not only become a certificate of having knowledge and understanding, but those individuals who do not have command over the English language or have less of it are not even considered literate. And this tragedy is also found in our beloved homeland that one reason for dividing the nation into two parts, i.e., elite and poor, is also this: that the identity of the elite is command over the English language and adopting the English lifestyle, whereas the poor, i.e., the common man, if he does not know English, is considered destitute in both respects, in knowledge and in employment.
Today, English language has been given such importance that without it no degree is considered a degree, without it no curriculum is complete, no syllabus is complete and no course is complete, due to which, according to a careful estimate, today in our country, in all the English-medium elite-class educational institutions, the students who acquire arts and sciences fail the most in Urdu and Islamiat subjects, whose number is said to be more than sixty percent, and forty percent do not even understand it, i.e., they consider these subjects as part of the syllabus but feel difficulties in taking their exams, while they recite and write English subjects like a parrot. This does not mean that children should not speak or read the English language or should not master it, but it should also not be that we push our national language Urdu to the background and to the extent that we become unfamiliar with it.
To compete with the world, to learn its tricks and to stand before our opponent, we must definitely have command over the English language and we have done so too, but it seems like an unnatural act that we are forgetting our national language Urdu, the example of which is like “the crow went to follow the swan’s walk and forgot its own walk.”
Under the auspices of Daily Express, a second two-day international conference has been organized at a local hotel, whose theme is “The Pressing Problems of Urdu and the New Generation.” Delegates from all over the world have been invited to this conference.
In the sessions of this conference, on the second and last day, i.e., today, the first session will be on the topic “Effects of Other Languages on Urdu,” which will be presided over by Dr. Linda Melawasiliu, while the speakers will include Dr. Fakhr-ul-Haq Noori, Dr. Nauman-ul-Haq, Dr. Asif Farrukhi, Dr. Shadab Ehsani and Atiya Syed.
The second session, “The Turmoil of Pakistani Society and the Role of the Writer,” will be presided over by Dr. Saleem Akhtar, while the speakers will include Asad Muhammad Khan, Masood Mufti, Mustansar Hussain Tarar, Masood Akhtar, Zahida Hina, Saleem Zar. The third session, “Urdu in India,” will be presided over by Intizar Hussain and the speakers will include Dr. Shamim Hanfi, Zubair Rizvi, Asghar Nadeem Syed, Dr. Nasir Abbas Nayyar. On this occasion, a Mushaira has also been arranged in which Zafar Iqbal, Anwar Masood, Zahra Nigah, Zubair Rizvi (India), Iftikhar Arif, Kishwar Naheed, Sahar Ansari, Khurshid Rizvi, Dr. Pirzada Qasim, Anwar Shaoor, Fahmida Riaz, Amjad Islam Amjad, Chang Shi Shuan (China), Asad Muhammad Khan, Sarmad Sahbai, Ata-ul-Haq Qasmi, Shahida Hassan, Khushbir Singh Shad (India), Najeeb Ahmed, Ayub Khawar, Ashfaq Hussain (Canada), Abbas Tabish, Yasmeen Hameed, Liaquat Ali Asim, Sabir Zafar, Suraj Narain, Mohsin Changezi, Javed Saba, and Saud Usmani will present their poetry. The promotion of Urdu language and making the new generation aware of the importance of the national language in this regard and acting on it is an important need of the time. However, the decision is now in the hands of the government. Well, in this regard, national hopes are being expressed that Urdu will soon be enforced as the national language at the official level.
