Punjabi dialects

Dialectology

The Linguistic Survey of India (completed in 1927) overseen by George A. Grierson conducted research onto Punjabi and Lahnda, however its linguistic veracity is questionable as per S. N. Gajendragadkar due to its data collection and processing being by the colonial establishment (including by un-trained patwaris) rather than linguists. Furthermore, it became outdated as newer dialects were discussed in academia. However, despite this it was a foundational work in the field of Punjabi linguistics. Most academic research on Punjabi dialects focus on the Eastern varieties, with there being less research being done on western varieties. Scientific study of dialectal phonology has mostly been conducted on eastern Punjabi varieties, such as by scholars Jain (1934), Arun (1961), Gill and Gleason (1962), Singh (1971), Dulai and Koul (1980), Bhatia (1993), Malik (1995), Shackle (2003), and Dhillon (2010). A few scholars who have researched the phonology of western Punjabi varieties include the likes of Bahri (1962) and Baart (2003, 2014). Linguists and other writers who studied Saraiki specifically include Burton (1849), O' Brien (1881), Bomford (1895), Jukes (1900), Wilson (1899), Grierson (1919), Smirnov (1975), and Shackle (1972, 1976, 2007), Mehr (1967), Fikri (1971), Zimi (1963, 1970), Wagha (1990, 1998), and Mughal (1990, 1996, 2000, 2003).

The creation of a dictionary for Lahndi and Malwai dialects was proposed in 1958. Ved Kumari Ghai researched tonality in Dogri (1968). In regards to dialectal linguistics, a reference grammar by Balbir Singh Sandhu on the Puadhi dialect was published in 1969, with another work by him on the same dialect's vowel, consonents, and suprasegmental phenomenon in 1974. S. S. Joshi did a dissertation on Doabi dialect's pitch, sentence and word intonation, and other aspects (using acoustic phonetics) that was published in 1972.

A major work that documented the dialects of Punjabi in a comprehensive manner was The Linguistic Atlas of Punjab (1972), the largest such study on Punjabi since the earlier Linguistic Survey of India. The accuracy of the atlas' dialectology, which challenged traditional dialect classifications, was praised by scholars like Christopher Shackle and R. K. Sprigg. Within the Linguistic Atlast of Punjab, the text of the folktale of Puran Bhagat is compared across locations, consisting of the vernacular spoken in Rawalpindi, Dhudial, Talagang, Mianwali, Sargodha, Jhang, Shujabad, Upper Mahasu, Lower Mahasu, Kangra, Kulu, Mandi, Chamba, Punch, Akhnur, Udhampur, Jammu-Tawi, Basoli, Samba, Kathua, Tarn Taran, Phagwara, Patiala, Barnala, and Rohtak.

E. B. A. Awan did his PhD dissertation in 1974 on the phonology and verbal phrases of Hindko dialect. Mukhtiar Singh Gill in 1975 conducted research on phonology and word formation regarding the dialect spoken in Barnala tehsil. In 1975, Atam Singh did phonological research on the Kharar vernacular. Manjit Singh Chahal conducted work on the lexis, tones, and inflexions of the Bawri dialect spoken by the Bouria tribe. In 1978, Joshi wrote a work on Doabi dialect's phonology and verbal phrases using a polysystemic method, published as a book in 1989. In 1982, Madhu Bala conducted phonological research on Kangri. In 1986, Punjabi University published a work on Puadhi dialect's consonants via instrumental analysis. Daljeet Kaur Dhandli and Neeta Sood conducted phonological research on Puadhi and Bahawalpuri (as spoken in Patiala), respectively. Sudhinder Kaur studied Patialvi. Research on the Lyallpuri Punjabi of Faisalabad has been carried out by Hussain (2015, 2017, 2019). Bashir & Conners (2019) is a grammatical description comparing Punjabi with Saraiki and Hindko.

History

Origin

According to Jagtar Singh Grewal, the Punjabi dialects started emerging between the fall of the empire of Harsha in the 7th century and the rise of the Delhi Sultanate in the 13th century. Padam (1954) believed that eastern Punjabi emerged from Shauraseni while Lahnda emerged from Paishachi. According to Mangat Bhardwaj, it is possible that the Western and Eastern Punjabi zones may have originally spoken different Apabhraṁśas, with the Lahnda zone being primarily Paiśāchī Apabhraṁśa while the Eastern Punjabi area consisted of a transitional zone of Śaurasenī merging into Paiśāchī, with Śaurasenī being spoken in the neighbouring Western Hindi zone. As per Suniti Kumar Chatterji (1926), the protoform of Sindhi, Lahndi, and Punjabi was Udicya (north-western dialects) while Punjabi also bore influence from Sourseni. According to Prabodh Pandit, the Indo-Aryan languages was initially split into three groups, with Punjabi, Lahndi, Sindhi, Kachchi, Kashmiri, and Pahari forming out of the north (north-western) group. As per this formulization, eastern Punjabi (originally very similar to Lahndi) was later influenced by the central zone, first by Śaurasenī and later by Braj, leading it to deviate from Lahndi. Glottolog identifies Paiśāchī as the ancestral language that the Punjabi dialects derived from. According to Padam, the Punjab dialects arose due to limited means of transportion and communication between peoples in pre-modern times, and also due to geographical boundaries caused by natural features like mountains and rivers, thus insular communities evolved their own variety overtime, causing further dialectal diversity. Dialectal variation also takes caste, profession, and creed into account. Amir Khusrau referred to the language spoken in the Lahore region as Lahauri, which later became known as Punjabi. Farid composed works in his Multani dialect. Guru Nanak's native lect was Shekhupuri. There was a long period of literary interaction between Western (Lahnda) and Eastern Punjabi in the subsequent period, showcased in the works of Muslim Sufis and Sikhs.

Mediaeval period

In pre-colonial Punjab, there was no standardised form of the Punjabi language (with it being primarily oral and lacking a formal grammar and lexicon) but rather several dialects and variants were utilised and built upon a linguistically heterogenous literary tradition. The scenario is described as a diglossia, where peoples' language varied depending on setting, such as if at home or in the bazaar, and medium, whether written or spoken. There was a difference between classical and vernacular registers. The inhabitants likely had degrees of intelligibility with neighbouring languages due to shared linguistic features and roots. The region was historically influenced by a variety of Punjabi dialects and other languages, such as Persian, Arabic, Sanskrit, Kashmiri, Balochi, Pashto, Khariboli, and Braj. A Sanskritic background became influence by Perso-Islamicate culture. A variety of scripts were in use for a variety of purposes, such as Perso-Arabic, Gurmukhi, and Landa, with spellings varying for words based upon individual preference or region. Persian was historically the administrative language of the Mughals and their successor states, including the Sikhs. In the 18th century, a special type of vernacular called Khalsa Bole developed amongst the Sikhs.

Colonial period

The British East India Company replaced Persian for administration with English and local Indian vernaculars in 1837. Punjab was annexed by the British in 1849. Due to the lack of a standardised register of Punjabi, a colonial-era belief that Punjabi was spoken by illiterates (due to its literary tradition being primarily oral and folklore-based rather than a written tradition), and its seemingly similar grammatical structure and vocabulary with Urdu, Urdu was selected as the administrative language of British Punjab rather than Punjabi. Punjabi was regarded by the early colonial administration as a dialect of Urdu. Christian missionary institutions, such as the Serampore Mission Press and especially the Ludhiana Mission Press, played a role in the standardisation of Punjabi sets. The press worked mostly in the eastern Punjabi dialect spoken in the Ludhiana region, which was regarded as 'European Standard Punjabi'. Grierson (1916) regarded the Majhi of Lahore and Amritsar as "pure" or "standard" Punjabi. Another influential dialect was Siraiki, spoken in the southwest and Multan area. The District Gazatteers produced by the colonial administration documented the local dialects of various Punjabi districts. Despite early attempts by the Christian missionaries, dialectal and regional variation of Punjabi remained prevalent and a standardised form was not fully realised. A standard Punjabi took on a more complete formulation under the Sikh reformers.

During the British colonial period, certain districts were made up of speakers of various dialects of Punjabi. Most areas under the control of the princely states of colonial Punjab were located in Malwai-speaking areas (other areas were in Haryanvi-speaking areas, not classified as a Punjabi dialect while Kapurthala had an estate in Awadh, a Hindustani area). However, certain areas of British Punjab contained speakers of other language groups, such as Haryanvi in parts of Ambala division and Pahari (such as Kangri) in Kangra district and other parts of Jalandhar division. The Punjab canal colonies project in the late 19th century brought many Eastern Punjabi speaking settlers into Western Punjabi speaking areas, with the reverse occurring in 1947. After the partition of 1947, refugees speaking various dialects resettled in different dialect areas, leading to influence on the local dialects and the transplantation of dialects. Eastern Punjabis settled in Gujranwala, Faisalabad, Lahore, and Sahiwal in Western Punjab after partition. Eastern Punjab came to be known as Chardha Punjab while Western Punjab became known as Lehnda Punjab. Furthermore, a term for united Punjab was coined, being Sanjha Punjab.

Modern period

India

Dialectal Punjabi is now in decline, being surmounted by Standard Punjabi, known as Taksali Punjabi, Kendri Punjabi , or Markazi Punjabi. In India, Modern Standard Punjabi is both spoken and written in Gurmukhi and is primarily based upon the Majhi dialect of Lahore, Amritsar, and Gurdaspur districts but also bears influence from other dialects. However, as per Bahl, it is a misconception that Modern Standard Punjabi is based primarily upon the Majhi dialect of Lahore, Amritsar, and Gurdaspur districts. According to Shackle, Modern Standard Punjabi's formation and evolution is closely tied with socio-religious movements associated with the Sikhs. Modern Standard Punjabi of the Sikhs was originally based on Majhi and Lahnda but after the partition of Punjab, it was later influenced by Malwai and Doabi, also being increasingly Sanskritized and de-Persianized. Eastern Punjabi is also being further influenced by Hindi.

Pakistan

In Pakistan, there have been proposals for a Pakistani Standard Punjabi. In December 1951, Faqeer Muhammad Faqeer advocated for the Pakistani standard to be based upon the dialect of the Gujranwala region due to its central location and literary history. Later, Sardar Muhammad Khan made the case for the usage of the Lahndi variety spoken in Warzirabad as the basis for a Pakistani Standard Punjabi. He also advocated for the usage of Perso-Arabic script. Waqar Ambalvi supported an Urduized form of Punjabi, which he termed Pāk Panjābī ("Pure/Pakistani Punjabi"), which incorporated Urduisms, considering it "beautiful" and "flavourful", however purists like Sardar Khan disapproved of this approach. As per K. R. Dikshit and Jutta K. Dikshit (2025), the standard Punjabi used in Pakistan is based upon the dialect of the districts of Lahore, Gujranwala, Sheikhupura, Kasur, Sialkot, Narowal, Gujrat, Okara and neighbouring districts. In Pakistan, a Saraiki identity has arisen which advocates for a separate linguistic identity. The Saraiki movement arose in the 1960s and has adopted historical figures like Shaikh Farid Shakarganj and Khwaja Ghulam Farid as literary antecedents.

Characteristics

The varieties of "Greater Punjabi" have a number of characteristics in common, for example the preservation of the Prakrit double consonants in stressed syllables. Other features of Punjabi dialects include an SOV word order, postpositions, gender and case systems, being concatenative language with agreement, and gender for nouns (animate or inanimate), verbs, postpositions, and most notably, phonemic tones. A feature that Punjabi has that somewhat differs it from other standard languages of India is tone as per Gleason and Gill. However, J. D. Singh notes that neighbouring vernaculars like Kangri, Bangru (Haryanvi), and Rajasthani also exhibit tonality. Tones developed in Punjabi via tonogenesis. However, there is a diversity within the Punjabi dialects regarding tonal features, such as:

• Loss of voiced aspirated stops (/bʰ d̪ʰ ɖʰ gʰ/) in eastern Punjab varieties
• Arising of contrastive tones in eastern Punjabi lects
• Loss of lost voiced aspirates and developed tones, seen in the western Punjabi dialects spoken in Lahore, Faisalabad, and Sargodha areas and neighboring regions
• Preservation of reserved voiced aspirates and contrast tones, such as in the case of the Awankari variety of Lahndi and the vernacular spoken in Jhelum and nearby
• Undergoing transition of a loss of aspiration contrast but without gaining contrastive tone, such as seen in the Jangli lect, especially the variety spoken in rural Faisalabad

Lahnda and to a lesser extent Eastern Punjabi both preserve Sanskrit case markers on nouns and pronouns, some Sanskrit markers on verb (including TMA, Tense Mood Aspect) and passive voice. A key difference between Western Punjabi (Lahnda) and Eastern Punjabi is that the former preserves breathy voiced consonants, which are no longer present in Eastern Punjabi. Hindko and Pothwari are mutually intelligible with Punjabi. Saraki is mutually intelligible with Punjabi. However, Saraiki has distinguishing features from Punjabi varieties, such as four distinctive implosive consonants (/b/, /d/, /g/, and /j/), that are pronounced with indrawn breath and contrast phonemically with the usual /b/, /d/, /g/, and /j/ of Punjabi. Furthermore, Saraiki has the typical Indo-Aryan aspirates, which are uniquely realized as tones in Punjabi. Saraiki also has five-way laryngeal contrast (/p pʰ b bʱ ɓ/) to differentiate it. Punjabi dialects have historically been influenced by other languages, such as Arabic, Persian, English, and Hindi-Urdu. In modern-times, Eastern Punjabi varieties are influenced by Sanskritisation (through Hindi) while Western Punjabi varieties are influenced by Urduisation. Some dialects have been considered transitional between other language groups, such as. Puadhi between Punjabi and Bangru (Haryanvi), in the south between Lahndi and Sindhi, and Bhattiani from Punjabi and Bagri (Rajasthani).

Geographic distribution

The Punjabi dialects do not have well-defined boundaries and generally merge into one another in a surreptitious fashion. As per a popular Punjabi idiom, the local language changes every twelve kohs.: As per Qandeel Hussain on Punjabi dialects, "There are no well-defined boundaries of modern Punjabi dialects. Each city has a slightly distinct dialect which merges with the neighboring cities". Christopher Shackle stated the following regarding the dialect continuum situation in Punjab:

In most other parts of the Indo-Aryan area, the continuum of related dialects has been overlaid in the modern period by carefully defined standard languages, but this process has not taken place in Punjab, where the British policy of using Urdu instead of any form of local speech as the official language has been continued in Pakistan.

— Christopher Shackle (5 October 2015), Siraiki language, Encyclopedia Britannica

Generally, eastern Punjabi dialects are primarily spoken in Indian Punjab while western Punjabi dialects are found in Pakistani Punjab. However, some dialects have been transplanted from their autochenous area due to refugee movement during the 1947 partition. In India, Punjabi is spoken in Punjab State and parts of Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir and Rajasthan (specifically Ganganagar tehsil). In Pakistan, it is spoken in Punjab Province and parts of the North-Western Frontier Province (now KPK), Sindh, and some territories of Jammu and Poonch. Inku, classified as part of the Punjabi macro-family by Ethnologue, was historically spoken in Afghanistan.

The literary standards that have developed on the basis of dialects are: Majhi-based Standard Punjabi in eastern and central Punjab, Saraiki in the southwest, and Pahari-Pothwari and Hindko in the northwest. A distinction is usually made between Eastern Punjabi in the east and Lahnda (Western Punjabi) in the west. Lahnda typically subsumes the Saraiki and Hindko varieties, with Jhangvi, Shahpuri, and Dhanni being intermediate between other Lahnda varieties and Eastern Punjabi. Pahari-Pothwari shares features with both Lahnda and Central/Eastern Punjabi. Khalsa Bole is a unique composite vernacular spoken by some Sikh groups that draws upon "a mixture of Punjabi, Old Hindi, Persian and other dialects used in various regions of India" for its vocabulary.

Pakistan

Punjabi, Hindko and Saraiki are listed separately in the census enumerations of Pakistan. According to the 2017 Census of Pakistan, there are 80,536,390 Punjabi speakers; 25,324,637 Saraiki speakers and 5,065,879 Hindko speakers. Saraiki was added to the census in 1981, and Hindko was added in 2017, prior to which both were represented by "Punjabi" in general. In areas such as Gujar Khan and Rawalpindi where Pothwari is the spoken variety, speakers significantly selected "Punjabi" instead of "Other" in all previous census enumeration. Saraiki is spoken in southern Punjab, Pakistan with some speakers in India.

Azad Jammu and Kashmir

In a statistical survey carried about by a proxy of the Government of Azad Kashmir, most speakers of Azad Kashmir spoke a variety of Pahari-Pothwari, while Majhi (represented simply as "Punjabi") attained a plurality in the Bhimber district. Some Pahari-Pothwari speakers in Azad Kashmir, like the ones in Pothohar, simply refer to their mother tongue as "Punjabi".

India

In India, Punjabi is listed as a constitutional language and is counted in the census returns. According to the 2011 Census of India, there are 33,124,726 Punjabi speakers which includes the varieties of Bagri (1,656,588 speakers) Bilaspuri (295,805 speakers) and Bhateali (23,970 speakers). Bagri is spoken in parts of Punjab, Haryana and Rajasthan. Bilaspuri and Bhateali are spoken in Himachal Pradesh. The status of Bagri is split between Punjabi and Rajasthani in the census returns with options available under Punjabi and Rajasthani. Gusain (1991) places Bagri as a Rajasthani dialect. Similarly, the identities of Bilaspuri and Bhateali are also split, in their case, between Punjabi and Dogri.

Lahnda (Western Punjabi) varieties are enumerated separately in the census returns in India with 108,791 speakers listed in the 2011 census. The varieties listed under Lahnda are 'Bahawalpuri' (29,253 speakers); 'Multani' which is described as 'Hindi Multani' (61,722 speakers) and unclassified (17,816 speakers). 'Poonchi' is spoken in Jammu; and is listed under Lahnda as it, together with 'Bahwalpuri' and 'Multani' satisfies the "criterion of 10,000 or more speakers at the all India level".

Historically, Dogri was considered to be a dialect of Punjabi spoken primarily in Jammu. In the 1941 Census, Dogri was listed under Punjabi. Since 2003, Dogri is listed as an independent language in the constitution of India. According to the 2011 Census - India, there are 2,596,767 Dogri speakers. Similar to Dogri, the Kangri language spoken in Himachal Pradesh was regarded as a Punjabi dialect but since 1971, it has been reclassified under Hindi. There were 1,117,342 Kangri speakers listed in the 2011 Census- India. Despite the independent status of Dogri and reclassification of Kangri, both languages are claimed to fall within Punjabi by some writers. Others place Dogri and Kangri within the Western Pahari group. Eberle et al. (2020) believe Dogri and Kangri are related to Eastern Punjabi and place these languages in a group of related languages descended from an intermediate division of Indo-Aryan languages.

Extinct lects

Extinct dialects include Lubanki, formerly spoken by the Labana, and Inku, formerly spoken by a peripatetic groups of Afghanistan.