Has anyone noticed......?

Arts & Culture Culture, Arts, Literature & Linguistics
1

our national anthem is written (almost) entirely in…FARSI!!!

I personally don’t mind (since farsi is beautiful islamic language) but isn’t it a bit strange?!

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Pak sar zamin shad bad
Keehswar-e-haseen shad bad
Tu-nishan-e-azm-e-aalishan, arz-e-Pakistan

Markaz-e-yaqin shadbad.

Pak sarzamin ka nizam, quwate, akhuwat-i, awam
Qaum, mulk, sultanat
Painda ta binda bad, shad bad manzil-e murad.

Parcham-e sitar-o-hilal
Rahbar-e tarraqi-o-kamal
Tarjuman-e-mazi, shan-e hal, jan-e istaqbal
Sayya-i Khuda-e Zul-jalal.

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(the only non-farsi word there is “ka” !!)

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[This message has been edited by Asif (edited November 02, 2001).]

2

......and why you didn't notice that urdu itself is an offspring of persian and arabic.....so why wondering???????

3

hmmm interesting, but not surprising.. Urdu does borrow so many Farsi words.

4

not surprising, since pakistan is defined as everything which s not indian, hence a national anthem that is barely, if ever, understood by its populace. i doubt in pak, which had 54% bengalis at time of partition, any bengali would have ever understood a word of it.

the tradition continues. pakistani punjab refuses to teach punjabi to kids. they would rather teach persian.

[This message has been edited by ZZ (edited November 02, 2001).]

5

ZZ serious haiN aap? Persian in Punjab mujhe tau kisi ne nahiN sikhai.

As far as Tanz goes, I asked three Indians to translate Indian national anthem, guess what?? Not one of them was able to complete it, let alone translate it :-p
And all three of them very much Indian and pretty smart ppl. As far as Pak national Anthem goes, anyone who understands Urdu will be able to not only read it but also understand it. Bengali I don't know, they might have had problems but now that's history.

6

ZZ–I’m a punjabi and i know farsi

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and i am in one way glad that our national anthem is in very highly persianised urdu–it differentiates us from you!

i have no problems understanding it and no educated person who knows high urdu would not understand it either. so there.

7

Akif, can you translate the following:

“Keehswar-e-haseen shad bad “

And what is this High Urdu. Ye Kitho say aai hey?

Please translate that in Low Urdu, for people like myself and ZZ. Tuhadee Urdu say ham ko BaooN Talkleef hoti hey.

8

I am having problems reading it because it is written phonetically in the Latin alphabet. It would be much easier to understand written in Urdu/Farsi.

9

[quote]
Originally posted by NYAhmadi:
**Akif, can you translate the following:

“Keehswar-e-haseen shad bad “**
[/quote]

kee = punjabi word meaning 'kya' in urdu = 'what' in english
swar = punjabi word meaning 'sawaar' in urdu = 'atop' or 'riding' in english
haseen = persian word meaning 'khoobsoorat' in urdu = 'beautiful' in english
shad = english word, a type of fish.
bad = english word, meaning 'bura' in urdu.

Translation:-
"What is on top of this beautiful fish? Its very bad (perhaps referring to the smell of the fish"

10

NYA yara, itni si urdu nahin samajhte?

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isliye ke is mein roz-marra urdu ka lafz hai hi nahin:

keeshwar = zameen -farsi word
haseen = khoobsurat

shaad = forever happy [farsi]

baad [be! -farsi]
translation in normal urdu:

ay khoobsurat zameen tu (hamesha keliye) khush reh!

O beautiful land, may you remain happy (for ever)

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11

asif, thanks for translation from 'high urdu' to 'normal urdu'.

that is the what naipaul call 'problem of the converted people'. they have to be holier than thou. thus they would rather have a national anthem in persian ('islamic language' according to asif. what makes persian islamic? it existed long before islam. it is not even language of quran. but what helped was that it does not belong to natives and comes from west from where invaders came of whom pak is proud to be conquered and converted which was good enough)

they wont have national anthem in sindhi or bengali or punjabi in any of which there is established literature for centuries and are ancient languages but persian alias 'high urdu'.

12

Sabah bibi,

gaur se dekhiye, ZZ bhai said “rather teach”.

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And you displayed exactly what ZZ bhai was pointing out in his first post - the urge to compare everything Pakistani with India and gloat over it. How did the Indian national anthem ever come into this context? There is definitely no comparison between the linguistic diversity that exists in India to that in Pakistan, and the reasons why the Indian anthem was chosen.

Also, just because one’s parents are Indian doesnt make one Indian. Your friends ovbiously never had any schooling in India.

Anyone who knows urdu can understand the Pak anthem? you sure?

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Asif bhai,

Slaughtering one’s centuries-old culture to look different from India is not really something to be proud of. Farsi is one of the best example of a language that has maintained it’s identity despite Persia having seen many conquests. No language is Islamic, other than Arabic.

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13

ZZ. Asif and Akif (the IF guys) pulled a fast one on you. Here’s the actual translation:

Keeshwar (Asif’s neighbor) got prettier (haseen) after getting married (Shad Bad).

14

Thank God you have been kicked out as moderator of this forum. Saray culture ka satiya-naas karr diya hai, iss tarah ki translation karr kay. Tuff hai!

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15

ZZ–yaar, relax

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The inclusion of the word “ka” made the national anthem an Urdu anthem even though the other words are all originally persian words; BUT they have been now accepted into urdu usage. and also you have to understand that in poetry a lot more use is made of persian than in everyday speech…so it is, technically, in Urdu. The proof? any educated indian hindu who knew urdu to advanced level could also understand it.

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You are right that persian has been around for millenia but the point i was making was that after arabic, more islamic literature is to be found in persian than in any other language; even in india the court language of the mughals was always persian (though there mother tongue was turki). in fact it is a known truism that if you want to polish your urdu, just learn farsi. in the same way if you know sanskrit, your hindi can become more polished.

personally, i wouldn’t mind if the national anthem was in ARABIC.

(even though i dont speak arabic). it couldn’t have been in baluchi, or punjabi or sindhi or pushto etc because these are regional languages and the national language is the one which should not discriminate against anyone group

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i think every paki should have to learn arabic from age 7 at school. i wish i had…

(actually i read somewhere that arabic WAS going to become the national language of pakistan but then the people who had migrated from india made a hue and cry to get urdu as the national language so the idea of having arabic was abandoned).

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shall i translate the whole anthem?

ps vaipaul is a clown and an islamophobe. he writes good prose but his understanding of islam is pathetic. he doesn’t understand what the concept of ummah means to Muslims therefore he can never understand that it is not islam that requires us to, in your words, adopt the language of the conquerors, but that we as Muslims LOVE everything associated with our beloved Prophet sal Allahu alayhi wa sallam and so we adapted “arabic” culture i.e. the culture of the Arabs AFTER Islam.

[This message has been edited by Asif (edited November 03, 2001).]

16

Not being a farsi speaker, I have used almost all these words in normal conversation. maybe more than i have used words in the works of Ghalib and Mir.

If you cant understand ateleast 80% of the words in the anthem, then you were probably asleep in urdu classes

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who does not use words like sarzameen, kamal, nishaan, haseen, tu, aali-shaan, markaz, yaqeen, quwaat, aquuwat, awaam, maazi, shaan, hal, khuda, saya, azm.

People like to just yip yap bout stuff.

17

I think the point some of us are trying to make is that it would have been nice if our national anthem was written in plain urdu so that a vast majority of people inlcuding laymen would understand what they are saying. The reason americans gets so choked up at the end of their anthem is because they know what it means....if it was written in Latin...it wouldn't have the same effect.

18

***Blessed be the sacred Land
Happy be the bounteous realm
Symbol of high resolve
Land of Pakistan
Blessed be thou citadel of faith

The order of this sacred land
Is the might of the brotherhood of the People
May the nation, the country, and the state
Shine in glory everlasting
Blessed be the goal of our ambition

This Flag of the Crescent and Star
Leads the way to progress and perfection

Interpreter of our past, glory of our present
Inspiration of our future
Symbol of Almighty's protection***

19

sky

and I contend that we can not cater to the laymen or rather if we had a better educational system they would understand it to.

Look at every single word in the anthem and count how many you use on a daily basis and how many you dont. Then compare it to a ghazal or poem by ghalib, faiz, and even Iqbal and compare the complexity.

I happen to believe that the national anthm of Pakistan is a beautiful and simple but very expressive anthem.

20

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Thats exactly what i was about to say…most of these words are used in everyday lives or in shaer-o-shayri. I had never felt that these words are from Farsi or Arabic…if read carefully everything is almost understandable…(exceptional for me since i haven’t been in touch with Urdu for almost 7…8 years)

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