PESHAWAR: The residents of Peshawar’s lone music colony fear that they are losing their own mother tongue ‘Marwari’ and with it they will be deprived of a beautiful panorama of an ancient culture of folklore.

The forefathers of the Marwari community had migrated from Rajasthan, India after partition but a few families relocated to Peshawar in search of better prospects in mid 70s. The local authorities allowed them to build cemented homes on the present site way back in 1985.

Ustad Safdar Ali, 64, a music director told this scribe that out of around 2,000 residents of the colony, about 200 were still affiliated with the profession of music. He said that despite being from music families, his community members could not find a platform in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa to promote their own mother tongue and preserve rich treasure of their Marwari folklore. He said that he had served at PTV and PBC for over four decades.

“Our people are fluent in Pashto, Hindko, Urdu, and Punjabi but unfortunately we are fast losing our own mother tongue at the cost of local languages because it has no market. No one understands our language outside this congested colony. I would entreat to officials to take steps to save our beautiful language from being extinct,” said Mr Ali.

Most members of the community have switched over to other professions

He said that only three or four musicians of his community, out of hundreds of deserving artists, were benefited from the government’s monthly stipend scheme. He said that many of his community members turned to other jobs. He added that most of his colleagues had stopped transferring their music skills to their children owing to non-availability of opportunities.

“Most of the young artists have turned to computer music as they are no more interested in learning traditional music. About 80 per cent of our youngsters are now practicing digital music. Only a few instrumentalists can play rabab, guitar, flute, harmonium and tabla. We speak Marwari in homes with our children and sing folk songs in our mother tongue during wedding ceremonies and at family gatherings and that’s it,” said the elderly musician.

Khalid Mian Khan, chief of Peshawar chapter of All Pakistan Music Council (APMC), said that Marwari musicians in Peshawar had been facing many issues. He said that his community enjoyed no health and education facilities for their families.

“Only men practice music, women are not allowed to join this field. Being very poor, a few could afford to send their children to schools. How nice would it be if either state-run TV/radio or private channels get record or put on air folk songs of our mother tongue so that we could also tell other what was our identity ,” Mr Khan wished.

He said Marwari had no script and had only oral tradition and folklore. He said if some steps were taken, their language and culture could be revived.

Irfan Ali, another young musician, said that not a single artist was accommodated in any mainstream organisation because of their unique ethnic identity. He said that culture directorate should work on their language and culture as it would add another colour to diversity.

Ustad Safdar Ali said that his mother tongue would be perished and a rich culture would be buried with it as nobody cared about its richness and human significance. He then sang an ancient lullaby in Marwari language which meant: “My dear child, sleep now , don’t go far away for playing sports because you are too small and innocent. A big stream called ‘Jumna’ is running nearby, its edges are slippery and you will drown in it.”

Published in Dawn, November 14th, 2017