ISLAMABAD – Around 27 languages spoken in Northern Areas, Kashmir, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and surrounding border areas of Pakistan are facing extinction, said a UNESCO report. The report, in connection with International Mother Day observed on Monday (Feb 21), revealed that language is the source of communication, education and progress and their extinction discontinues the transfer of social values to the coming generation and eventually the language are declared as dead languages.
In Pakistan, Punjabi has the highest number of speakers which are 48 percent of the total population. However, Sindhi is spoken by 12 percent, Pashto and Urdu eight percent, Balochi three percent, Hindko two percent and Barohi one percent. A total 6912 languages are spoken in the world while 516 have been declared dead languages.
However, 36 percent languages are endangered and will die out soon because of globalization, the research added. To save language as they are the identity of a nation, the Pakistan Academy of Letters (PAL) is giving equal importance to all languages of Pakistan and a comprehensive program has been
formulated in this regard.
PAL Chairman Fakhar Zaman said all the languages spoken in Pakistan are the national languages (of Pakistan) and Urdu besides being a national language is the official and lingua franca of the country. “All the languages of the country are Pakistani languages and we should strive to make the mother languages as part of curriculum on the primary level,” he said.
