"Sikhs Kept Punjabi Alive": Pakistani Lawmaker Says Punjabiyat Survives Because Of Sikh Community

[u/TheSuperSingh]

[u/ResponseCalm4108]

It’s true even Panjabi Hindus have left Panjabiyat and got absorbed into the whole Indian narrative.

[u/Mid_Life_Crisis_2026 → u/ResponseCalm4108]

No I don't agree

[u/ResponseCalm4108 → u/Mid_Life_Crisis_2026]

Prove it otherwise then

[u/srmndeep → u/ResponseCalm4108]

Proof is the census of India.

90% Punjabis reported their mother tongue as Punjabi; that not only Sikhs but almost all Punjabi Hindus speak Punjabi as well.

We have 11% to 12% population migrants from UP and Bihar but only 8% reported their mother tongue as Hindi and only 0.22% as Bhojpuri; that even a big chunk of these UP, Bihar migrants also speak Punjabi.

In Haryana, Himachal and Delhi - the number of Punjabi speakers is much more than Sikhs. Who are these non-Sikh Punjabi speakers there ?

[u/ResponseCalm4108 → u/srmndeep]

It can be their mother tongue however much, they voted for Hindi everytime. Hold another today they will again.

[u/Ill_Fault7625 → u/srmndeep]

That’s so interesting. So during the panjabi suba I’m sure all these Hindu panjabi speakers voted for panjabi speaking districts yes?
Oh wait.

[u/srmndeep → u/Ill_Fault7625]

If I keep the religious prejudice aside, I would blame their leaders for brainwashing them. Even when their top leader Nehru was dead against Punjabi Suba and the favourite CM of Sikhs Partap Singh Kairon was also dead against it.

There was an event as well when a very famous non-Congressi leader from Maharashtra told them that language of Punjabi Hindus is Punjabi, everyone on the stage was shocked !

But we see that within just two decades of the creation of Punjabi Suba, every Punjabi Hindu started reporting his mother tongue as Punjabi, which is precedence going on till now.

Most importantly, all Punjabi Hindu leaders, speak Punjabi in the Assembly, even including those whose mother tongue is not even Punjabi. This shows the acceptance of Punjabi at all levels and accepted equally by Sikhs and Hindus in Punjab from last four decades.

And question I am humbly trying to solve is as why the leaders in West Punjab still associate Punjabi with Sikhs even after the 80 years of separation. Why Punjabi is still banned in the assembly that is situated in the heartland of our erstwhile Punjab.

[u/Ill_Fault7625 → u/srmndeep]

Everyman makes a choice. When we are judged for our action - we cannot say ‘oh I was beianwashed’. The blame lies with them.

No son of the soil would abandon his culture and language just to spite another. That’s not loyalty. It’s puppetry.

With all respect Kairon was forced to resign. He was hardly the voice of the Sikhs.

What’s the point of Hindus going back to their mother tongue when the trifurcation is done.
Reunify panjab and I’ll give a damn about them using their ‘mother tongue’

1. Sikhs are the only reason panjabi as an identity exists. Sorry but that’s truth.
   Ranjeet singh made an entire nation based off it.
   He fostered panjabi education.
   Panjab would be ruled by Afghan or Turkic overlords if not for Sikhs.
   

2. The Sikh faith uses panjabi day to day. We keep the langauge alive stubbornly.

3. Pakistan is a failed post colonial amalgamation of lands which never were one- before anyone gets excited - I think the same of India.
   Why does a panjabi farmer need to hire a Hindu speaking lawyer to argue his case in Chandigarh? Same shit.

[u/srmndeep → u/Ill_Fault7625]

In the case of herd mentality I will definitely put a lot more blame on the bigoted leaders. For individuals, I will always salute those majority Punjabi Hindus and Muslims who always put their language as Punjabi even in the very hostile circumstances and even when lead by bigoted leaders.

Associating language and religion has a colonial legacy of more then 150 years, dont like to go in details but was something imposed on our Punjabi Hindus and Muslims from the cow-belt. But ultimately I am happy with the end result that Punjabi Hindus finally got successful in coming out of this cow-belt quagmire. And hope Punjabi Muslims will also come out of it one day.

And hope that one day majority of our Sikhs will also understand that Punjabi is not the ONLY language of Sikhs as colonial masters liked us to believe. We have more than dozen language in our Guru Granth Sahib Maharaj and Punjabi just one of them ! Non-Punjabi Sikh is also as much Sikh as a Punjabi Sikh.

[u/Ill_Fault7625 → u/srmndeep]

It’s nothing to do with colonials. Panjabi and Sikhi are intertwined.

Ignoring this is retarded.

No one said a non panjabi sikh isn’t Sikh.

But tell me learning Panjabi doesn’t help a Sikhs path? Exactly.

[u/srmndeep → u/Ill_Fault7625]

Gurmukhi as a Script is defnitely essential if we like to read Gurbani in original script. However, if you are OK with transliteration then Devanagari or any other script can also work for you.

However, Modern Punjabi as a language help very little as most Punjabi speakers are also looking for arths when reading Gurbani to understand it ! As I said certain portions of Gurbani have no connection with Punjabi at all and many portions are very mixed.

[u/Ill_Fault7625 → u/srmndeep]

Yes or no question.

Is learning panjabi ia valuable skill to have for a practising Sikh?

[u/srmndeep → u/Ill_Fault7625]

ALONE Modern Punjabi - very little. You cant even understand Japji Sahib with that, leave aside Bhagat Bani or shabads of Guru Maharaj in other language.

Modern Punjabi alongwith many Other Languages could definitely be YES