Identity: MPAs urged to speak Punjabi in PA

LAHORE: World Punjabi Congress (WPC) chairman Fakhar Zaman has written a letter to Provincial Assembly members calling upon them to adopt Punjabi as the [official] language at the assembly.

Zaman said in a press release that former chief minister Pervaiz Elahi had passed a rule under which MPAs were allowed to speak in Punjabi. “Unfortunately, the MPAs desisted from speaking their mother tongue owing to their inferiority complex and being illiterate in the context of the language and Punjabi culture,” he said.

The WPC chairman said that according to UNESCO statistics, Punjabi was the 10th most widely spoken language in the world. He said it was sad that the government was not declaring it the medium of instruction at the primary level.

Zaman said Punjabi politicians, the bureaucracy and the elite were the “biggest enemies of the great language”.

Zaman said 10,000 people with master’s degree in Punjabi were unemployed.

He stressed the need for establishing the first-ever Punjabi University in Lahore. He said more funds should be allocated for the organisations working for the promotion of Punjabi.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 22^nd, 2016.