HYDERABAD: Linguists and literati have demanded national language status for all languages spoken in the country and urged the Sindh government to introduce Sindhi as official language in the province by passing a bill.

They said that Pakistan was the only federation where one language had been thrust on the country and other historic languages had been denied their due status.

They were speaking at the first session of the second day of a conference organised by the Sindhi Language Authority (SLA) to mark the international day of mother tongues here on Wednesday.

Chairing the first session, noted writer Ghulam Hussain Rangrez said that as long as Sindhis did not own their motherland, they would not be able to protect their language.

He demanded that besides Sindhi all other languages that were spoken in Pakistan should be given national language status.

Noted writer Fatima Hassan said that educated mothers always played a vital role not only in the development of their home but also entire nation and observed that nations were always known by their culture.

Culture, history and progress were directly linked with language, she said.

The director of Seraiki language department at the Bahauddin Zakariya University, Nasim Akhtar, said that man was incomplete withoutlanguage. Sindhi and Seraiki were sister languages. Mother tongues had to play an important role in development of a nation, he said.

Sindhology director Ishaq Samejo called for promoting mother tongues at home as much as possible in order to promote them. He was critical of the fact that children of those who were seen complaining that Sindhi was not taught in private schools were getting education in Englishmedium schools.

Dr Sikandar Shoro, chief minister`s adviser on information technology and sciences, said that children were always strongly influenced by their mother tongues and it had always had a strong impact on them.

Noted writer Jami Chandio said that societies were always formed on the basis of language and it was called mother language because a child always learned it from the mother`s lap.

He said that Sindhi had different accents but it was crystal clear that Sindhi was the mother tongue of all Sindhis. There should be no bias in languages because they were not big or small.

Pakistan was a multinational state and there was no federation where there was one national language. Sindhis had no issue with Urdu. PPP government should take steps to introduce Sindhi as official language in Sindh besides pursuing bill in the Senate, he said. He said that if it was introduced in Sindh, then multinational companies and other private institutions would be forced to use Sindhi in their communication.

Noted academician Inam Shaikh said that the state would lose its essence if languages wereexcluded. Pakistan was a unique state which was not ready to respect different languages and cultures, he said.

Chairing the second session, Prof Qalandar Shah Lakyari said that from day one, different languages were not accepted. Sindhi did face threat but its proper use could protect it. Urdu was always preferred over other mother languages, he said.

Hamid Ali Baloch of Balochistan University said that Balochi language was spoken in other parts of Pakistan yet it was not accepted in Balochistan at official level. It faced a direct threat.

Balochi had always faced state`s wrath. Balochi language faced different kinds of hurdles in its promotion and development. The period 20052016 was the worst for Balochi when book shops were raided in 2014 in his province.

Balochi books were seized while poets and writers were arrested. Today, 70 years down the road, rulers were still embroiled in Urdu, Arabic and English languages.

Jamil Ahmed Pal, a scholar from Lahore, discussed Punjabi language and said that they were not able to give due importance to Punjabi language.

After British rule Punjabis` eight generations were forced to adopt Urdu language. Punjab was a major hurdle in getting national language status for other languages.

Dr Abdullah Jan Abid, Sahar Gul Bhatti, Karachi University`s Sajida Parveen and others alsospoke attheconference.