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The Pakistan Press Foundation (PPF) organized a seminar for journalists titled “Promoting Vernacular Languages’ Media in Cyberspace” in connection with United Nations’ International Mother Language Day, the theme of which, this year, is devoted to the topic of languages and cyberspace.
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PPF Seminar "Promoting Vernacular Languages’ Media in Cyberspace"
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February 23, 2006 |
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Karachi |
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Speakers (from left to right): Mr. Usman Arab Satti, Dr. Jabbar Khattak, Mr. Noman Saigal, Dr. Fauzia Jaffery and Ms. Samina Ishaque. |
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The Pakistan Press Foundation (PPF) organized a seminar for journalists titled “Promoting Vernacular Languages’ Media in Cyberspace” in connection with United Nations’ International Mother Language Day, the theme of which, this year, is devoted to the topic of languages and cyberspace.
Mr. Noman Saigal, Advisor to CM Sindh for Information Technology was the chief guest at the seminar and other speakers included: Dr. Jabbar Khattak, Secretary General, Sindhi Media Forum, Mr. Usman Arab Satti, Chief Editor, Daily Vatan (Gujrati) Karachi Mr. Zahoor A. Malik, Editor, Kook Saraiki, Karachi and Dr. Fauzia Jaffery, Professor, Mass Communications Department, Karachi University.
The speakers at the seminar emphasized on taking special measures for promoting vernacular languages and their media in cyberspace. The speakers suggested that the mother tongues should be made medium of instruction to promote local languages, as it would pave way for the development of vernacular languages’ media in cyberspace.
“Unfortunately, the illiteracy is main hurdle in development of local languages. The literacy rate shows that majority of the people can not read and write even in their own mother tongue, therefore it is imperative to promote literacy first,” Noman Saigal, Advisor to Sindh Chief Minister for Environment, Alternate Energy & Information Technology said. He however viewed that since the Urdu was our national language spoken and understood by most of the people across the country, it should be given priority and then other languages should be linked to it under a well-designed plan.
According to him the IT department of Sindh government lacks technically sound personnel and added, “The IT department is just 3-year old however it is working on 19 projects worth Rs. 3 billion and hopefully there would be improvement with passage of time.” Advisor told that all the IT projects underway were in English language. Noman Saigal said that one of the projects undertaken by his department was establishing Computer Awareness Centers in the province under which 20 centers have been setup across the province out of 400. “We would try now to introduce Sindhi computer training at these centers,” he said on a suggestion.
Earlier, Dr. Abdul Jabbar Khattak, editor of Sindhi daily Awami Awaz, said unfortunately the local languages had always been suppressed in Pakistan and denied of due status contrary to other countries, especially the India, where all the loc
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Some of the participants |
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al languages including Sindhi, Gujrati have been declared national languages. He said that Pushto language has its own alphabet in Afghanistan where it is being taught at educational institutions but in NWFP any person who tried to develop or demanded to promote this language was labeled as anti-Pakistan.
Jabbar Khattak stressed on declaring Sindhi, Balochi, Pushto, Punjabi, Siraiki and other languages as the national languages of Pakistan. He told the participants that Sindhi was the first language in Pakistan to have its own typewriter and the computerized newspapers while the Urdu got these things much later. On this occasion, Zahid Mirani, the web editor of Awami Awaz gave presentation on development of online editions of Sindhi dailies. He told that 52 letters of Sindhi alphabet have been integrated with 65000 characters of uni-code making it possible for a Sindhi-knowing person to send e-mail in Sindhi and even enjoy chatting.
Usman Arab Satti, chief editor, Gujrati daily ‘Vatan’ and having done graduation in Gujrati language told that there were 79 web sites in Gujrati language that has its own alphabet. According him, the Gujrati language newspapers had a larger readership up to eighties but later it started declining, as the Gujrati subject is not being taught in educational institutions. The daily newspaper caters to a vast business community which is predominantly Gujrati speaking, and also to people of the province of Gujarat in India and also in other areas of India and the world. He suggested introduction of this subject as an elective language in schools.
Dr. Fauzia Jaffery, Professor, Mass Communication Department, Karachi University also stressed on promoting vernacular languages in cyberspace. She viewed that speaking in mother language gives comfort and compared the existence of different languages with flowers of different kinds and colors stressing that efforts should be made for all the local languages to flourish. Zahoor A. Malik, editor, Siraiki weekly ‘Kook’ published from Karachi deplored that the local languages were being neglected at government level. He said the Siraiki was the language spoken by majority of people in Pakistan but it has only one newspaper that also is faced with problem of survival for being neglected in government advertisements. Zahoor Malik told that a Siraiki TV channel would be launched shortly.
Ms. Samina Ishaque, Director, PPF also spoke and told that there were about one hundred online editions of newspapers and magazines of which only few were in Urdu and Sindhi and one each in Pushto, Pothohari and Gujrati.
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