[postlink]https://saraikitube.blogspot.com/2012/01/saraikies-in-hindustan.html[/postlink]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wt4dG6g2Kwsendofvid
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Saraiki is the language of love and literature .Saraiki is the most widely spoken language in Pakistan and the first language of more than 120 million people in the World.Among those 80 Million are in Pakistan (2008). Saraiki is a language of great antiquity in Pakistan. It served as "Lingua Franca" among the people living around i.e. the Bloch and Sindhis, the Pashtoons etc. for centuries. It also remained the language of commerce and trade until recent times.
It has been variably called by different names such as Seraiki,siraiki, Baluchki, Partake , Shahpuri , Jagdali, Riasti, Lanhda,Bahawalpuri, Derewali, Multani, Western Punjabi, Uchi, Thallochi, Shahpuri and Hindko in past by neighboring people .
Saraiki people are different in their food habits, dress, folk dances, games, amusements, mindset and psyche. They love their language & homeland and are often reluctant to leave their birthplace contrary to Punjabis and Pashtoons.
The main cities are princely state of Bahawalpur and the districts of Sukkur, Larkana, Dadu, Sehwan, Sanghar, Nawabshah, Hyderabad, Sindh, Mirpurkhas, Multan, Rajanpur, Dera Ghazi Khan, MuzafarGarh, Layyah, Bhakkar, Mianwali, Dera Ismail Khan, Karachi. A significant number of Seraikis also reside in India, with most concentrated in the state of Punjab, Maharashtra and Gujarat. . A significant number of Seraikis also reside in Afghanistan.
Historically, the speakers of dialects now recognized as belonging to Sarāikī did not hold the belief that they constituted a cohesive language community or a distinct ethnicity. This consciousness developed among local elites in the years after the founding of Pakistan in 1947 in response to the social and political upheaval caused by the mass immigration of Urdu speaking refugee Muslims from India. Traditionally, the dialects were designated by any of a number of areal or demographic names (see table below), e.g. "Multani" for the dialect spoken around Multan, which has been the largest city in the "Sarāikī" speaking area for centuries. The name "Sarāikī" (or variant spellings) was formally adopted in the 1960s by regional social and political leaders who undertook to promote Sarāikī ethnic consciousness and to develop the vernaculars into a standardized written language
The word "Sarāiki" originated from the word "سوویرا" Sauvira .a state name in old India . By adding adjectival suffix "-ki" to the word "Sauvirā" it became "Sauvirāki". {Sauvira was a kingdom mentioned in the epic Mahabharata. According to the epic, Jayadratha was the king of Sindhus, Sauviras and Sivis. Probably Sauvira and Sivi were two kingdoms close to the Sindhu kingdom and Jayadratha conquered them.According to some texts, Sauvira was south of Sindhu in the delta of the Indus river; while later historians (Al-Beruni) considered Sauvira to represent Saraiki waseb, including Multan, Mithankot and adjacent areas at the region of the confluence of Indus river with other rivers of Punjab. Sauvira is presumed to be derived from two words: Su (great or good) or Sau (one hundred) and Veer (brave or wise). Sauviraki, the language spoken by inhabitants of the Sauvira kingdom, is currently known as Saraiki and has spread to the entire south and southwest parts of Punjab.(Dr. A H Dani)}.and Bahauddin Zakariya University, in Multan, department established 2006)
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