Language
The Garhwali language (गढ़वळि भाख/भासा) is a Central Pahari language belonging to the Northern Zone of Indo-Aryan languages and is native to Garhwal.
Garhwali like other languages changed a lot with the course of time. Ancient Garhwali was close to Sanskrit being a dialect of it and which was later influenced by Prakrit and the famous Saursheni apabhrasha of Hindi. So it can be said that that the Garhwali language developed from or is a mixed form of the following languages:
- Sanskritvedic/Puranic and Lokik)
- Pali/Prakrit
- Hindi(Saurseni Apabhrasha)
With the course of time and due to the migrants Garhwali has borrowed words from Punjabi, Urdu, Bengali, Pahari, rajasthani.... etc. and hence enriching its vocabulary.
Garhwali is one of the 325 recognised languages of India spoken by over 2,267,314 people in Tehri Garhwal, Pauri Garhwal, Uttarkashi, Chamoli, Dehradun, Haridwar and Rudraprayag districts of Uttarakhand. Garhwali is also spoken by people in other parts of India including Himachal Pradesh, Delhi, Haryana, Punjab, Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, the official language of India. However, due to a number of reasons, Garhwali is one of the languages which is shrinking very rapidly. UNESCO's Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger designates Garhwali as a language which is in the unsafe category and requires consistent conservation efforts.
Read more about this topic: Garhwali People
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