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95-449: Pakistan Telecommunication Company Ltd. , commonly known as PTCL ( Urdu : پاکستان ٹیلی کمیونیکیشن کمپنی لمیٹڈ ) is the national telecommunication company in Pakistan . PTCL provides telephone and internet services nationwide and is the backbone for the country's telecommunication infrastructure. The corporation manages and operates around 2000 telephone exchanges across the country, providing

190-633: A dialect continuum ranging from Persianised to Sanskritised vocabulary, but now they are more and more different in words due to politics. Old Urdu dictionaries also contain most of the Sanskrit words now present in Hindi. Mutual intelligibility decreases in literary and specialised contexts that rely on academic or technical vocabulary. In a longer conversation, differences in formal vocabulary and pronunciation of some Urdu phonemes are noticeable, though many native Hindi speakers also pronounce these phonemes. At

285-623: A 100% stake in Telenor Pakistan for US$ 493 million. Urdu language Urdu ( / ˈ ʊər d uː / ; اُردُو , pronounced [ʊɾduː] , ALA-LC : Urdū ) is a Persianised register of the Hindustani language , an Indo-Aryan language spoken chiefly in South Asia . It is the national language and lingua franca of Pakistan , where it is also an official language alongside English . In India , Urdu

380-442: A common Sanskrit - and Prakrit -derived vocabulary base, phonology , syntax , and grammar, making them mutually intelligible during colloquial communication . While formal Urdu draws literary, political, and technical vocabulary from Persian , formal Hindi draws these aspects from Sanskrit; consequently, the two languages' mutual intelligibility effectively decreases as the factor of formality increases. Urdu originated in

475-453: A complaint with PTA alleging that PTCL was actively blocking Nayatel IP addresses as Nayatel terminated their bandwidth agreement directly with PTCL due to price gouging . Nayatel instead opted to purchase PTCL bandwidth through Telenor Pakistan and Zong CMPak who were authorized by PTA to resell to other licensees, as this was more cost effective for Nayatel. However, PTCL refused to allow Nayatel's traffic to pass through its network since

570-406: A core vocabulary of native Sanskrit and Prakrit derived words and a significant number of Arabic and Persian loanwords, with a consensus of linguists considering them to be two standardised forms of the same language and consider the differences to be sociolinguistic ; a few classify them separately. The two languages are often considered to be a single language (Hindustani or Hindi-Urdu) on

665-423: A direct current (DC) voltage at a nominal voltage of −48V when the receiver is on-hook, supplied by a power conversion system in the central office. This power conversion system is backed up with a bank of batteries, resulting in continuation of service during interruption of power to the customer supplied by their electrical utility. The maximum resistance of the loop is 1,700   ohms , which translates into

760-661: A distinction between Urdu and Hindi, leading to the Hindi–Urdu controversy . According to 2022 estimates by Ethnologue and The World Factbook , produced by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), Urdu is the 10th-most widely spoken language in the world , with 230 million total speakers, including those who speak it as a second language . The name Urdu was first used by the poet Ghulam Hamadani Mushafi around 1780 for Hindustani language even though he himself also used Hindavi term in his poetry to define

855-537: A heavy influence on both as a co-official language. According to Bruce (2021), Urdu has adapted English words since the eighteenth century. A movement towards the hyper-Persianisation of an Urdu emerged in Pakistan since its independence in 1947 which is "as artificial as" the hyper-Sanskritised Hindi that has emerged in India; hyper-Persianisation of Urdu was prompted in part by the increasing Sanskritisation of Hindi. However,

950-507: A literary medium for Indian writers from the Bombay Presidency, Bengal, Orissa Province, and Tamil Nadu as well. As Urdu and Hindi became means of religious and social construction for Muslims and Hindus respectively, each register developed its own script. According to Islamic tradition, Arabic , the language of Muhammad and the Qur'an , holds spiritual significance and power. Because Urdu

1045-399: A maximum loop length of 18,000 feet or 5 km using standard 24- gauge wire . (Longer loops are often constructed with larger, lower-resistance 19-gauge wire and/or specialized central office equipment called a loop extender . They may be 50,000 feet [15 km] or more.) Many calling features became available to telephone subscribers after computerization of telephone exchanges during

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1140-547: A monopoly for voice, data and TV in Bahria Town. The Competition Commission of Pakistan (CCP) issued a show-cause notice to Bahria Town for abusing its dominant position. After the case was heard, a fine of 2 million PKR was imposed on Bahria Town and CCP ordered them to allow Nayatel and any other potential entrants to lay their fiber infrastructure, allowing healthy competition in the ISP sector. On 14 February 2024, Nayatel submitted

1235-577: A notable novel being Umrao Jaan Ada . According to the Navadirul Alfaz by Khan-i Arzu, the "Zaban-e Urdu-e Shahi" [language of the Imperial Camp] had attained special importance in the time of Alamgir ". By the end of the reign of Aurangzeb in the early 1700s, the common language around Delhi began to be referred to as Zaban-e-Urdu , a name derived from the Turkic word ordu (army) or orda and

1330-563: A par value of Rs. 10 per share. These vouchers were converted into PTCL shares in mid-1996. On 31 December 1995, the Pakistan Telecommunication (Reorganization) Act, 1996, was passed, which formally reconstituted the Pakistan Telecommunication Corporation as PTCL. The act facilitated the transfer of the telecommunications business, along with its associated assets, rights, liabilities, and obligations, from

1425-525: A period of time. Recent DSL services launched by PTCL reflects this by the introduction of a new brand name and operation of the service being directly supervised by PTCL. As telecommunication monopolies head towards an imminent end, services and infrastructure providers are set to face even bigger challenges. The post-monopoly era came with Pakistan’s Liberalization in Telecommunication in January 2003. On

1520-692: A phonological level, speakers of both languages are frequently aware of the Perso-Arabic or Sanskrit origins of their word choice, which affects the pronunciation of those words. Urdu speakers will often insert vowels to break up consonant clusters found in words of Sanskritic origin, but will pronounce them correctly in Arabic and Persian loanwords. As a result of religious nationalism since the partition of British India and continued communal tensions, native speakers of both Hindi and Urdu frequently assert that they are distinct languages. The grammar of Hindi and Urdu

1615-573: A policy continued by the Mughal Empire , which extended over most of northern South Asia from the 16th to 18th centuries and cemented Persian influence on Hindustani. Urdu was patronised by the Nawab of Awadh and in Lucknow , the language was refined, being not only spoken in the court, but by the common people in the city—both Hindus and Muslims; the city of Lucknow gave birth to Urdu prose literature, with

1710-498: A sectarian divide of "Urdu" for Muslims and "Hindi" for Hindus, a divide that was formalised with the partition of colonial India into the Dominion of India and the Dominion of Pakistan after independence (though there are Hindu poets who continue to write in Urdu, including Gopi Chand Narang and Gulzar ). Urdu had been used as a literary medium for British colonial Indian writers from

1805-477: A significant role in the development of the Urdu register. Hindi became the distinct register spoken by those who sought to construct a Hindu identity in the face of colonial rule. As Hindi separated from Hindustani to create a distinct spiritual identity, Urdu was employed to create a definitive Islamic identity for the Muslim population in India. Urdu's use was not confined only to northern India – it had been used as

1900-478: A strike price of PKR 30 and was subsequently listed on the Karachi Stock Exchange (KSE) in 1996. PTCL launched its mobile and data services subsidiaries in 2001 by the name of Ufone and PakNet respectively. None of the brands made it to the top slots in the respective competitions. Lately, however, Ufone had increased its market share in the cellular sector. The PakNet brand has effectively dissolved over

1995-594: A symbol of their religious identity. Hindus in northwestern India, under the Arya Samaj agitated against the sole use of the Perso-Arabic script and argued that the language should be written in the native Devanagari script, which triggered a backlash against the use of Hindi written in Devanagari by the Anjuman-e-Islamia of Lahore. Hindi in the Devanagari script and Urdu written in the Perso-Arabic script established

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2090-419: A uniting language. Urdu was chosen as a symbol of unity for the new Dominion of Pakistan in 1947, because it had already served as a lingua franca among Muslims in north and northwest of British Indian Empire . Urdu is also seen as a repertory for the cultural and social heritage of Pakistan. While Urdu and Islam together played important roles in developing the national identity of Pakistan, disputes in

2185-459: A very significant number among the nearly 800 districts of India, there is a small Urdu-speaking minority at least. In Araria district , Bihar, there is a plurality of Urdu speakers and near-plurality in Hyderabad district, Telangana (43.35% Telugu speakers and 43.24% Urdu speakers). Some Indian Muslim schools ( Madrasa ) teach Urdu as a first language and have their own syllabi and exams. In fact,

2280-596: Is an Eighth Schedule language , the status and cultural heritage of which are recognised by the Constitution of India ; and it also has an official status in several Indian states. In Nepal , Urdu is a registered regional dialect and in South Africa , it is a protected language in the constitution. It is also spoken as a minority language in Afghanistan and Bangladesh , with no official status. Urdu and Hindi share

2375-515: Is not officially recognised by the Government of Bangladesh . The Urdu spoken by Stranded Pakistanis in Bangladesh is different from this dialect. Many bilingual or multi-lingual Urdu speakers, being familiar with both Urdu and English, display code-switching (referred to as " Urdish ") in certain localities and between certain social groups. On 14 August 2015, the Government of Pakistan launched

2470-488: Is one variety, is spoken much more widely, forming the third most commonly spoken language in the world, after Mandarin and English . The syntax (grammar), morphology , and the core vocabulary of Urdu and Hindi are essentially identical – thus linguists usually count them as one single language, while some contend that they are considered as two different languages for socio-political reasons. Owing to interaction with other languages, Urdu has become localised wherever it

2565-572: Is read and written as in other parts of India. A number of daily newspapers and several monthly magazines in Urdu are published in these states. Dhakaiya Urdu is a dialect native to the city of Old Dhaka in Bangladesh , dating back to the Mughal era . However, its popularity, even among native speakers, has been gradually declining since the Bengali Language Movement in the 20th century. It

2660-543: Is said to have arisen as the "language of the camp", or " Zaban-i-Ordu " means " Language of High camps " or natively " Lashkari Zaban " means " Language of Army " even though term Urdu held different meanings at that time. It is recorded that Aurangzeb spoke in Hindvi, which was most likely Persianized, as there are substantial evidence that Hindvi was written in the Persian script in this period. During this time period Urdu

2755-661: Is shared, though formal Urdu makes more use of the Persian "-e-" izafat grammatical construct (as in Hammam-e-Qadimi , or Nishan-e-Haider ) than does Hindi. The following table shows the number of Urdu speakers in some countries. Plain old telephone service POTS was the standard service offering from telephone companies in the United States from 1876 until 1988 , when the Integrated Services Digital Network (ISDN) Basic Rate Interface (BRI)

2850-648: Is spoken by large numbers of migrant South Asian workers in the major urban centres of the Persian Gulf countries. Urdu is also spoken by large numbers of immigrants and their children in the major urban centres of the United Kingdom , the United States, Canada, Germany, New Zealand, Norway, and Australia. Along with Arabic , Urdu is among the immigrant languages with the most speakers in Catalonia . Religious and social atmospheres in early nineteenth century India played

2945-485: Is spoken, including in Pakistan. Urdu in Pakistan has undergone changes and has incorporated and borrowed many words from regional languages, thus allowing speakers of the language in Pakistan to distinguish themselves more easily and giving the language a decidedly Pakistani flavor. Similarly, the Urdu spoken in India can also be distinguished into many dialects such as the Standard Urdu of Lucknow and Delhi , as well as

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3040-471: Is used in education , literature , office and court business, although in practice, English is used instead of Urdu in the higher echelons of government. Article 251(1) of the Pakistani Constitution mandates that Urdu be implemented as the sole language of government, though English continues to be the most widely used language at the higher echelons of Pakistani government. Urdu is also one of

3135-566: The Bombay , Bengal , Orissa , and Hyderabad State as well. Before independence, Muslim League leader Muhammad Ali Jinnah advocated the use of Urdu, which he used as a symbol of national cohesion in Pakistan. After the Bengali language movement and the separation of former East Pakistan , Urdu was recognised as the sole national language of Pakistan in 1973, although English and regional languages were also granted official recognition. Following

3230-645: The Central Hindi Directorate was established earlier in 1960, and the promotion of Hindi is better funded and more advanced, while the status of Urdu has been undermined by the promotion of Hindi. Private Indian organisations such as the Anjuman-e-Tariqqi Urdu, Deeni Talimi Council and Urdu Mushafiz Dasta promote the use and preservation of Urdu, with the Anjuman successfully launching a campaign that reintroduced Urdu as an official language of Bihar in

3325-683: The Dakhni ( Deccan ) of South India. Because of Urdu's similarity to Hindi , speakers of the two languages can easily understand one another if both sides refrain from using literary vocabulary. Although Urdu is widely spoken and understood throughout all of Pakistan, only 9% of Pakistan's population spoke Urdu according to the 2023 Pakistani census . Most of the nearly three million Afghan refugees of different ethnic origins (such as Pashtun , Tajik , Uzbek , Hazarvi , and Turkmen ) who stayed in Pakistan for over twenty-five years have also become fluent in Urdu. Muhajirs since 1947 have historically formed

3420-514: The Devanagari and Latin script ( Roman Urdu ) to allow its survival, or whether this will only hasten its demise and that the language can only be preserved if expressed in the Perso-Arabic script. For Pakistan, Willoughby & Aftab (2020) argued that Urdu originally had the image of a refined elite language of the Enlightenment, progress and emancipation, which contributed to the success of

3515-517: The Ilm Pakistan movement, with a uniform curriculum in Urdish. Ahsan Iqbal , Federal Minister of Pakistan, said "Now the government is working on a new curriculum to provide a new medium to the students which will be the combination of both Urdu and English and will name it Urdish." Standard Urdu is often compared with Standard Hindi . Both Urdu and Hindi, which are considered standard registers of

3610-597: The Khariboli dialect of the Delhi region). Dakhni (also known as Dakani, Deccani, Desia, Mirgan) is spoken in Deccan region of southern India . It is distinct by its mixture of vocabulary from Marathi and Konkani , as well as some vocabulary from Arabic, Persian and Chagatai that are not found in the standard dialect of Urdu. Dakhini is widely spoken in all parts of Maharashtra , Telangana , Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka . Urdu

3705-477: The Punjabi elite of Pakistan, have adopted Urdu as a mother tongue and identify with both an Urdu speaker as well as Punjabi identity. Urdu was chosen as a symbol of unity for the new state of Pakistan in 1947, because it had already served as a lingua franca among Muslims in north and northwest British India . It is written, spoken and used in all provinces/territories of Pakistan , and together with English as

3800-399: The de jure legal status and de facto political status of Urdu, how much Urdu is used as language of instruction and chosen by students in higher education, and how the maintenance and development of Urdu is financially and institutionally supported by governments and NGOs. In India, although Urdu is not and never was used exclusively by Muslims (and Hindi never exclusively by Hindus),

3895-483: The 'CharJi' brand name with coverage in over 70 cities. Service is only available through their provided mobile hotspot device . PTCL announced the termination of CharJi services across several cities in Pakistan effective 30th June 2024. Existing customers are being given an option to migrate to Ufone. Ufone is a wholly owned subsidiary of PTCL, it also the fourth and the smallest cellular provider in mainland Pakistan. It provides GSM , HSPA+ and LTE services over

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3990-538: The 18th century and two similar standard forms came into existence in Delhi and Lucknow . Since the partition of India in 1947, a third standard has arisen in the Pakistani city of Karachi . Deccani , an older form used in southern India , became a court language of the Deccan sultanates by the 16th century. Urdu has a few recognised dialects, including Dakhni , Dhakaiya , Rekhta , and Modern Vernacular Urdu (based on

4085-476: The 1950s (particularly those in East Pakistan , where Bengali was the dominant language), challenged the idea of Urdu as a national symbol and its practicality as the lingua franca . The significance of Urdu as a national symbol was downplayed by these disputes when English and Bengali were also accepted as official languages in the former East Pakistan (now Bangladesh ). Urdu is the sole national, and one of

4180-479: The 1960s, the Urdu lobby and eventually the Urdu language in Pakistan has been associated with religious Islamism and political national conservatism (and eventually the lower and lower-middle classes, alongside regional languages such as Punjabi, Sindhi, and Balochi), while English has been associated with the internationally oriented secular and progressive left (and eventually the upper and upper-middle classes). Despite governmental attempts at Urduisation of Pakistan,

4275-688: The 1970s. In the former Jammu and Kashmir state , section 145 of the Kashmir Constitution stated: "The official language of the State shall be Urdu but the English language shall unless the Legislature by law otherwise provides, continue to be used for all the official purposes of the State for which it was being used immediately before the commencement of the Constitution." Urdu became a literary language in

4370-680: The 1979 Soviet Invasion of Afghanistan and subsequent arrival of millions of Afghan refugees who have lived in Pakistan for many decades, many Afghans, including those who moved back to Afghanistan, have also become fluent in Hindi-Urdu, an occurrence aided by exposure to the Indian media, chiefly Hindi-Urdu Bollywood films and songs. There have been attempts to purge Urdu of native Prakrit and Sanskrit words, and Hindi of Persian loanwords – new vocabulary draws primarily from Persian and Arabic for Urdu and from Sanskrit for Hindi. English has exerted

4465-445: The 1980s in the United States. The services include voicemail , caller ID , call waiting , speed dialing , conference calls (three-way calling), enhanced 911 , and Centrex services. The communication circuits of the public switched telephone network continue to be modernized by advances in digital communications; however, other than improving sound quality, these changes have been mainly transparent to customers. In most cases,

4560-629: The 26% of PTCL shares along with management control of the then telecom monopoly for US$ 2.6 billion. As of 2019, Etisalat has held back $ 800m amount over a property-transfer dispute with the Pakistani government. The government's plan of privatizing the corporation was not welcomed in all circles; countrywide protests and strikes were held by PTCL workers. They disrupted phone lines of institutions like Punjab University Lahore along with other public sector institutions. PTCL provides fixed-line telephone services across Pakistan. Wireless voice services used to be provided through PTCL's CDMA2000 network, which

4655-686: The 62% of shares still remain under the management of government-ownership of state-owned corporations of Pakistan. In May 2021, Etisalat by e& appointed Hatem Bamatraf as President and Group CEO of PTCL. Hatem previously served as the CTO of Etisalat. It was known as the Posts & Telegraph Department in 1949 and as Pakistan Telephone & Telegraph Department in 1962. Pakistan Telecommunication Corporation (PTC) took over operations and functions from Pakistan Telephone and Telegraph Department under Pakistan Telecommunication Corporation Act 1991. This coincided with

4750-562: The 900, 1800 and 2100 MHz bands. In addition to voice and data services, PTCL also offers digital TV services based on DVB-IPTV under PTCL Smart TV brand name. PTCL users can also stream live TV using the Smart TV smartphone application. PTCL has been involved in anti-competitive practices several times in the recent years, particularly in the twin cities of Islamabad and Rawalpindi . In 2006, PTCL terminated Nayatel's E1 link at their colocation facility despite Nayatel fulfilling all

4845-581: The Capital was relocated to Delhi and named Shahjahanabad and the Bazar of the town was named Urdu e Muallah. In the Akbar era the word Rekhta was used to describe Urdu for the first time. It was originally a Persian word that meant "to create a mixture". Amir Khusrau was the first person to use the same word for Poetry. Before the standardisation of Urdu into colonial administration, British officers often referred to

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4940-426: The English liked to use the name "Moors" for Urdu: I have a deep knowledge [ je possède à fond ] of the common tongue of India, called Moors by the English, and Ourdouzebain by the natives of the land. Several works of Sufi writers like Ashraf Jahangir Semnani used similar names for the Urdu language. Shah Abdul Qadir Raipuri was the first person who translated The Quran into Urdu. During Shahjahan's time,

5035-468: The Government level, a comprehensive liberalization policy for the telecoms sector is in the offering. In 2005, Government of Pakistan decided to sell 26 percent of the company to some private corporation. There were three participants in the bidding process for the privatization of PTCL. Etisalat , an Abu Dhabi company was able to get the shares with a large margin in the bid. In June 2005, Etisalat won

5130-438: The Government's competitive policy, encouraging private sector participation and resulting in the award of licenses for cellular, card-operated pay-phones, paging and, lately, data communication services. Pursuing a progressive policy, the Government in 1991, announced its plans to privatize PTCL, and in 1994 issued six million vouchers exchangeable into 600 million shares of the would-be PTCL in two separate placements. Each had

5225-618: The Heathens, or from the Persians, or other Nations. In 1715, a complete literary Diwan in Rekhta was written by Nawab Sadruddin Khan . An Urdu-Persian dictionary was written by Khan-i Arzu in 1751 in the reign of Ahmad Shah Bahadur . The name Urdu was first introduced by the poet Ghulam Hamadani Mushafi around 1780. As a literary language, Urdu took shape in courtly, elite settings. While Urdu retained

5320-405: The Indian government do not actively support the preservation of Urdu in professional and official spaces. Because the Pakistani government proclaimed Urdu the national language at Partition, the Indian state and some religious nationalists began in part to regard Urdu as a 'foreign' language, to be viewed with suspicion. Urdu advocates in India disagree whether it should be allowed to write Urdu in

5415-425: The Indian subcontinent (12th to 16th centuries) led to the development of Hindustani as a product of a composite Ganga-Jamuni tehzeeb . In cities such as Delhi, the ancient language Old Hindi began to acquire many Persian loanwords and continued to be called "Hindi" and later, also "Hindustani". An early literary tradition of Hindavi was founded by Amir Khusrau in the late 13th century. After

5510-445: The absorption of vocabulary from various regional Pakistani languages, while some Urdu vocabularies has also been assimilated by Pakistan's regional languages. Some who are from a non-Urdu background now can read and write only Urdu. With such a large number of people(s) speaking Urdu, the language has acquired a peculiar Pakistani flavor further distinguishing it from the Urdu spoken by native speakers, resulting in more diversity within

5605-673: The area of the Ganges-Yamuna Doab , though significant development occurred in the Deccan Plateau . In 1837, Urdu became an official language of the British East India Company , replacing Persian across northern India during Company rule ; Persian had until this point served as the court language of various Indo-Islamic empires . Religious, social, and political factors arose during the European colonial period that advocated

5700-548: The bandwidth was purchased through a reseller. PTCL had started with 10 digit numbers for landline telephones. The first three (in case of smaller cities, 4 or 5) signified the area code (e.g. 042 for Lahore) and the rest (7 for large cities, 6 or 5 for smaller ones) were the subscribers number. Due to the large demand for landlines in Lahore and Karachi, in 2009, PTCL decided to increase the 7-digit subscriber numbers to 8-digits, adding "9" before existing Government numbers and "3" before

5795-617: The conquest of the Deccan , and a subsequent immigration of noble Muslim families into the south, a form of the language flourished in medieval India as a vehicle of poetry, (especially under the Bahmanids ), and is known as Dakhini , which contains loanwords from Telugu and Marathi . From the 13th century until the end of the 18th century; the language now known as Urdu was called Hindi , Hindavi , Hindustani , Dehlavi , Dihlawi , Lahori , and Lashkari . The Delhi Sultanate established Persian as its official language in India,

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5890-491: The corporation to PTCL. However, certain exclusions were allocated to the National Telecommunication Corporation (NTC), Frequency Allocation Board (FAB), Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA), and Pakistan Telecommunication Employees Trust (PTET). As part of the reorganization process, the Government of Pakistan divested 26 percent of its PTCL shares through an initial public offering (IPO) at

5985-415: The early 21st century an increasing percentage of Indian Muslims began switching to Hindi due to socio-economic factors, such as Urdu being abandoned as the language of instruction in much of India, and having limited employment opportunities compared to Hindi, English and regional languages. The number of Urdu speakers in India fell 1.5% between 2001 and 2011 (then 5.08 million Urdu speakers), especially in

6080-687: The function of the local loop presented to the customer for connection to telephone equipment is practically unchanged and remains compatible with pulse dialing telephones. Due to the wide availability of traditional telephone services, new types of communications devices, such as modems and fax machines , were initially designed to use traditional analog telephony to transmit digital information. Although POTS provides limited features, low bandwidth , and no mobile capabilities, it provides greater reliability than other telephony systems (mobile phone, VoIP , etc.). Many telephone service providers attempt to achieve dial-tone availability more than 99.999% of

6175-518: The grammar and core Indo-Aryan vocabulary of the local Indian dialect Khariboli, it adopted the Nastaleeq writing system – which was developed as a style of Persian calligraphy. Throughout the history of the language, Urdu has been referred to by several other names: Hindi, Hindavi, Rekhta, Urdu-e-Muallah, Dakhini , Moors and Dehlavi . In 1773, the Swiss French soldier Antoine Polier notes that

6270-473: The independence movement. But after the 1947 Partition , when it was chosen as the national language of Pakistan to unite all inhabitants with one linguistic identity, it faced serious competition primarily from Bengali (spoken by 56% of the total population, mostly in East Pakistan until that attained independence in 1971 as Bangladesh ), and after 1971 from English. Both pro-independence elites that formed

6365-541: The language as " Moors " or "Moorish jargon". John Gilchrist was the first in British India to begin a systematic study on Urdu and began to use the term "Hindustani" what the majority of Europeans called "Moors", authoring the book The Strangers's East Indian Guide to the Hindoostanee or Grand Popular Language of India (improperly Called Moors) . Urdu was then promoted in colonial India by British policies to counter

6460-458: The language in the Perso-Arabic script in courts and government offices, though Hindus continued to employ the Devanagari script in certain literary and religious contexts. Through the late 19th century, people did not view Urdu and Hindi as being two distinct languages, though in urban areas, the standardised Hindustani language was increasingly being referred to as Urdu and written in the Perso-Arabic script. Urdu and English replaced Persian as

6555-570: The language of Bollywood films tend to contain a large number of Persian and Arabic words and thus considered to be "Urdu" in a sense, especially in songs. India has more than 3,000 Urdu publications, including 405 daily Urdu newspapers. Newspapers such as Neshat News Urdu , Sahara Urdu , Daily Salar , Hindustan Express , Daily Pasban , Siasat Daily , The Munsif Daily and Inqilab are published and distributed in Bangalore, Malegaon, Mysore, Hyderabad, and Mumbai . Outside South Asia, it

6650-883: The language. In India, Urdu is spoken in places where there are large Muslim minorities or cities that were bases for Muslim empires in the past. These include parts of Uttar Pradesh , Madhya Pradesh , Bihar , Telangana , Andhra Pradesh , Maharashtra ( Marathwada and Konkanis), Karnataka and cities such as Hyderabad , Lucknow , Delhi , Malerkotla , Bareilly , Meerut , Saharanpur , Muzaffarnagar , Roorkee , Deoband , Moradabad , Azamgarh , Bijnor , Najibabad , Rampur , Aligarh , Allahabad , Gorakhpur , Agra , Firozabad , Kanpur , Badaun , Bhopal , Hyderabad , Aurangabad , Bangalore , Kolkata , Mysore , Patna , Darbhanga , Gaya , Madhubani , Samastipur , Siwan , Saharsa , Supaul , Muzaffarpur , Nalanda , Munger , Bhagalpur , Araria , Gulbarga , Parbhani , Nanded , Malegaon , Bidar , Ajmer , and Ahmedabad . In

6745-450: The language. Ordu means army in the Turkic languages . In late 18th century, it was known as Zaban-e-Urdu-e-Mualla زبانِ اُرْدُوئے مُعَلّٰی means language of the exalted camp . Earlier it was known as Hindvi, Hindi and Hindustani . Urdu, like Hindi , is a form of Hindustani language . Some linguists have suggested that the earliest forms of Urdu evolved from the medieval (6th to 13th century) Apabhraṃśa register of

6840-473: The largest fixed-line network. Data and backbone services such as GSM, HSPA+, CDMA, LTE, broadband internet, IPTV, and wholesale are an increasing part of its business. Originally a state-owned corporation, the shareholding of PTCL was reduced to 62%, when 26% of shares and control were sold to Etisalat Telecommunications while the remaining 12% to the general public in 2006 under an intensified privatization program under Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz . However,

6935-420: The late 19th century, remaining largely unchanged despite the introduction of innovations such as Touch-Tone dialing, electronic telephone exchanges and fiber-optic communication into the public switched telephone network (PSTN). Modern, automated POTS is characterized by several aspects: The pair of wires from the central office switch to a subscriber's home is called a subscriber loop . It carries

7030-729: The leadership of the Muslim League in Pakistan and the Hindu-dominated Congress Party in India had been educated in English during the British colonial period, and continued to operate in English and send their children to English-medium schools as they continued dominate both countries' post-Partition politics. Although the Anglicized elite in Pakistan has made attempts at Urduisation of education with varying degrees of success, no successful attempts were ever made to Urduise politics,

7125-466: The legal system, the army, or the economy, all of which remained solidly Anglophone. Even the regime of general Zia-ul-Haq (1977–1988), who came from a middle-class Punjabi family and initially fervently supported a rapid and complete Urduisation of Pakistani society (earning him the honorary title of the 'Patron of Urdu' in 1981), failed to make significant achievements, and by 1987 had abandoned most of his efforts in favour of pro-English policies. Since

7220-404: The main languages of instruction, although the people from differing provinces may have different native languages. Urdu is taught as a compulsory subject up to higher secondary school in both English and Urdu medium school systems, which has produced millions of second-language Urdu speakers among people whose native language is one of the other languages of Pakistan – which in turn has led to

7315-451: The majority population in the city of Karachi , however. Many newspapers are published in Urdu in Pakistan, including the Daily Jang , Nawa-i-Waqt , and Millat . No region in Pakistan uses Urdu as its mother tongue, though it is spoken as the first language of Muslim migrants (known as Muhajirs ) in Pakistan who left India after independence in 1947. Other communities, most notably

7410-403: The most Urdu-speaking states of Uttar Pradesh (c. 8% to 5%) and Bihar (c. 11.5% to 8.5%), even though the number of Muslims in these two states grew in the same period. Although Urdu is still very prominent in early 21st-century Indian pop culture, ranging from Bollywood to social media, knowledge of the Urdu script and the publication of books in Urdu have steadily declined, while policies of

7505-564: The most alive language and moving ahead with times" in India. This phenomenon pertains to the decrease in relative and absolute numbers of native Urdu speakers as opposed to speakers of other languages; declining (advanced) knowledge of Urdu's Perso-Arabic script, Urdu vocabulary and grammar; the role of translation and transliteration of literature from and into Urdu; the shifting cultural image of Urdu and socio-economic status associated with Urdu speakers (which negatively impacts especially their employment opportunities in both countries),

7600-461: The official languages in northern parts of India in 1837. In colonial Indian Islamic schools, Muslims were taught Persian and Arabic as the languages of Indo-Islamic civilisation ; the British, in order to promote literacy among Indian Muslims and attract them to attend government schools, started to teach Urdu written in the Perso-Arabic script in these governmental educational institutions and after this time, Urdu began to be seen by Indian Muslims as

7695-565: The officially recognised languages in India and also has the status of "additional official language" in the Indian states of Andhra Pradesh , Uttar Pradesh , Bihar , Jharkhand , West Bengal , Telangana and the national capital territory Delhi . Also as one of the five official languages of Jammu and Kashmir . India established the governmental Bureau for the Promotion of Urdu in 1969, although

7790-438: The ongoing Hindi–Urdu controversy and modern cultural association of each language with the two religions has led to fewer Hindus using Urdu. In the 20th century, Indian Muslims gradually began to collectively embrace Urdu (for example, 'post-independence Muslim politics of Bihar saw a mobilisation around the Urdu language as tool of empowerment for minorities especially coming from weaker socio-economic backgrounds' ), but in

7885-588: The others (e.g. the number 042-7878787 before 2009, was changed to 042-37878787). PTCL successfully carried out 5G trials in February 2021 and achieved download speeds up to 1.7 Gbps in their testing environment. After Telenor ASA announced in November 2022 that they would leave the Pakistani market, the sale of Telenor Pakistan to PTCL was announced in December 2023. Subject to regulatory approvals, PTCL will acquire

7980-511: The position and prestige of English only grew stronger in the meantime. There are over 100 million native speakers of Urdu in India and Pakistan together: there were 50.8 million Urdu speakers in India (4.34% of the total population) as per the 2011 census; and approximately 16 million in Pakistan in 2006. There are several hundred thousand in the United Kingdom, Saudi Arabia, United States, and Bangladesh . However, Hindustani, of which Urdu

8075-543: The preceding Shauraseni language , a Middle Indo-Aryan language that is also the ancestor of other modern Indo-Aryan languages. In the Delhi region of India the native language was Khariboli , whose earliest form is known as Old Hindi (or Hindavi). It belongs to the Western Hindi group of the Central Indo-Aryan languages. The contact of Hindu and Muslim cultures during the period of Islamic conquests in

8170-476: The previous emphasis on Persian. In colonial India, "ordinary Muslims and Hindus alike spoke the same language in the United Provinces in the nineteenth century, namely Hindustani, whether called by that name or whether called Hindi, Urdu, or one of the regional dialects such as Braj or Awadhi ." Elites from Muslim communities, as well as a minority of Hindu elites, such as Munshis of Hindu origin, wrote

8265-429: The requirements as per their interconnect agreement. In November 2010, LINKdotNET (part of Mobilink , now Jazz ) and Micronet Broadband in a complaint to PTA, accused PTCL of charging excessively high prices for bandwidth to other ISPs, whilst subsidizing its own DSL tariffs. Again in 2016, PTCL and Bahria Town were both involved in preventing other ISPs from laying fiber infrastructure in, effectively giving PTCL

8360-636: The same language, Hindustani (or Hindi-Urdu), share a core vocabulary and grammar . Apart from religious associations, the differences are largely restricted to the standard forms : Standard Urdu is conventionally written in the Nastaliq style of the Persian alphabet and relies heavily on Persian and Arabic as a source for technical and literary vocabulary, whereas Standard Hindi is conventionally written in Devanāgarī and draws on Sanskrit . However, both share

8455-583: The style of Urdu spoken on a day-to-day basis in Pakistan is akin to neutral Hindustani that serves as the lingua franca of the northern Indian subcontinent. Since at least 1977, some commentators such as journalist Khushwant Singh have characterised Urdu as a "dying language", though others, such as Indian poet and writer Gulzar (who is popular in both countries and both language communities, but writes only in Urdu (script) and has difficulties reading Devanagari, so he lets others 'transcribe' his work) have disagreed with this assessment and state that Urdu "is

8550-428: The time the telephone is taken off-hook . This is an often cited benchmark in marketing and systems-engineering comparisons, called the " five nines " reliability standard. It is equivalent to having a dial-tone available for all but about five minutes each year. However, POTS depends upon a hardwired connection from each household to the phone company. Many new housing developments are being offered which do not have such

8645-425: The two official languages of Pakistan (along with English). It is spoken and understood throughout the country, whereas the state-by-state languages (languages spoken throughout various regions) are the provincial languages , although only 7.57% of Pakistanis speak Urdu as their first language. Its official status has meant that Urdu is understood and spoken widely throughout Pakistan as a second or third language. It

8740-477: Was broadcast over the 1900 MHz WLL frequency under the 'Vfone' brand name, however, the network was shut down on 31 August 2016 nationwide to allow the spectrum to be re-farmed for PTCL's 'CharJi' LTE service. PTCL offers three different types of fixed-line broadband across 2,000 cities* in Pakistan with plans ranging from 2 Mbit/s to 250 Mbit/s. *PTCL's FlashFiber is currently only offered in 70 cities. PTCL also offers TDD-LTE based Wireless Broadband under

8835-591: Was intentioned as means of unification for Muslims in Northern India and later Pakistan, it adopted a modified Perso-Arabic script. Urdu continued its role in developing a Pakistani identity as the Islamic Republic of Pakistan was established with the intent to construct a homeland for the Muslims of Colonial India. Several languages and dialects spoken throughout the regions of Pakistan produced an imminent need for

8930-404: Was introduced, followed by the development of cellular telephone systems and voice over internet protocol (VoIP). Despite the advent of these technologies, POTS remains a basic form of residential and small business connection to the telephone network in many parts of the world. The term encapsulates a technology that has been available since the introduction of the public telephone system in

9025-547: Was referred to as "Moors", which simply meant Muslim, by European writers. John Ovington wrote in 1689: The language of the Moors is different from that of the ancient original inhabitants of India but is obliged to these Gentiles for its characters. For though the Moors dialect is peculiar to themselves, yet it is destitute of Letters to express it; and therefore, in all their Writings in their Mother Tongue, they borrow their letters from

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