What is Punjabi?
Punjabi (sometimes spelt Panjabi) is a language spoken predominantly on the Indian sub-continent by approximately 60 million people. There are two variants: eastern Punjabi spoken by people from India and western Punjabi spoken by people from Pakistan. In India, Punjabi is an official state language and is written in Gurmukhi script. In Pakistan, Punjabi is written in a script called Shahmukhi. Even though Punjabi is spoken by approximately 30 million people (representing the single largest linguistic group), it is not an official language of Pakistan. Due to the promotion of Urdu in Pakistan, Punjabi’s formal use in Pakistan is considerably less so than in India. There are also large numbers of Punjabi speakers in countries around the world (especially the UK, Canada and United States). These are predominately immigrants or descendents of immigrants from the Indian sub-continent.
