Dhatki (धाटकी; ڍاٽڪي), also known as Dhatti (धाटी; ڍاٽي) or Thari (थारी; ٿَري), is one of the

Rajasthani languages Rajasthani (Devanagari: ) refers to a group of Indo-Aryan languages and dialects spoken primarily in the state of Rajasthan and adjacent areas of Haryana, Gujarat, and Madhya Pradesh in India. There are also speakers in the Pakistani provinces ...

of the Indo-Aryan branch of the

Indo-European language The Indo-European languages are a language family native to the overwhelming majority of Europe, the Iranian plateau, and the northern Indian subcontinent. Some European languages of this family, English, French, Portuguese, Russian, Dutch ...

family. Dhatki is closely related to Sindhi and Marwari both.

Speakers

Dhatki/Dhati has two major dialects Jaisalmeri and the other one spoken in tharparker, Jaisalmeri is spoken in western parts of

Jaisalmer Jaisalmer , nicknamed "The Golden city", is a city in the Indian state of Rajasthan, located west of the state capital Jaipur. The town stands on a ridge of yellowish sandstone and is crowned by the ancient Jaisalmer Fort. This fort contains a ...

and Barmer districts & Southern part of

Jalore Jalore () ( ISO 15919 : ''Jālora'' ), also known as ''Granite City'', is a city in the western Indian state of Rajasthan. It is the administrative headquarters of Jalore District. It has a river known as Jawai Nadi. Jalore lies to south of ...

district of

Rajasthan Rajasthan (; lit. 'Land of Kings') is a state in northern India. It covers or 10.4 per cent of India's total geographical area. It is the largest Indian state by area and the seventh largest by population. It is on India's northwestern si ...

, India and other in eastern parts of

Sindh Sindh (; ; ur, , ; historically romanized as Sind) is one of the four provinces of Pakistan. Located in the southeastern region of the country, Sindh is the third-largest province of Pakistan by land area and the second-largest province ...

Pakistan Pakistan ( ur, ), officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan ( ur, , label=none), is a country in South Asia. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by population, fifth-most populous country, with a population of almost 24 ...

. Some Dhatki-speaking communities migrated to

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

in 1947 after the independence and continued to do so in small numbers after that date, but the great majority of Dhatki speakers still reside in

. Dhatki/Dhati is spoken by these communities: * The Tharis * Kunbhar * Thari

Maheshwaris Maheshwari, also spelled Maheshvari, is a Hindu caste of India, originally from what is now the state of Rajasthan. Their traditional occupation is that of commerce and as such they form part of the wider Bania occupation-based community that ...

Rajputs Rajput (from Sanskrit ''raja-putra'' 'son of a king') is a large multi-component cluster of castes, kin bodies, and local groups, sharing social status and ideology of genealogical descent originating from the Indian subcontinent. The term Ra ...

Rajpurohit Rajpurohit (Sanskrit:राजपुरोहित) is a Brahmin sub caste residing in South Asia natively in western Rajasthan of India. They maintain traditions that are similar to both Brahmins and Rajputs. They are historically engaged into ...

* Charan * Sodha *

Khatri Khatri is a caste of the Indian subcontinent that is predominantly found in India, but also in Pakistan and Afghanistan. In the subcontinent, they were mostly engaged in mercantilistic professions such as banking and trade, they were the d ...

Malhi Malhi may refer to: People * Ali Asjad Malhi, Pakistani politician of Punjabi ancestry * Naseer Ahmad Malhi, Pakistani politician of Punjabi ancestry * Harinder Malhi, Canadian politician of Punjabi ancestry * Gobind Malhi, Indian writer of Si ...

* Suthar * Bajeer * Sonara *

Meghwal The Meghwal (also known as Megh and Meghraj) people live primarily in northwest India, with a small population in Pakistan. Their traditional occupation was agricultural farming, cattle-herding and weaving. Meghwals are known for their contr ...

* Behil *

Harijan Dalit (from sa, दलित, dalita meaning "broken/scattered"), also previously known as untouchable, is the lowest stratum of the castes in India. Dalits were excluded from the four-fold varna system of Hinduism and were seen as forming ...

* Garasiya The majority speakers of Dhatki language live in

Umerkot District Umerkot District (Dhatki: عمرکوٹ / عمرڪوٽ, sd, عمرڪوٽ ضلعو, ur, ), also known as Amarkot District, is a district in the Sindh province of Pakistan. The city of Umerkot is the capital of the district. Sindhi is the native l ...

and

Tharparkar District Tharparkar (Dhatki/ sd, ٿرپارڪر, ur, ), also known as Thar, is a district in Sindh province in Pakistan headquartered at Mithi. Before Indian independence it was known as the Thar and Parkar district. The district is the largest in Sin ...

. 60% of the language's speakers are Muslims, 35% are Hindu and the remaining 5% practice traditional folk religions.

Phonology

Dhatki has

implosive Implosive consonants are a group of stop consonants (and possibly also some affricates) with a mixed glottalic ingressive and pulmonic egressive airstream mechanism.''Phonetics for communication disorders.'' Martin J. Ball and Nicole Müller. Ro ...

consonants, unlike other closely related Rajasthani languages but like the neighbouring (but more distantly related)

Sindhi language Sindhi ( ; , ) is an Indo-Aryan language spoken by about 30 million people in the Pakistani province of Sindh, where it has official status. It is also spoken by a further 1.7 million people in India, where it is a Scheduled languages of India ...

. It is likely that these consonants developed in the language from contact with more culturally dominant Sindhi speakers. Aside from this, its phonology is much like other Indo-Aryan languages: ;Notes # Marginal and non-universal phonemes are in parentheses. is lateral for some speakers (Masica 1991:98). # is post-velar. Dhakti has a fairly standard set of vowels for an Indo-Aryan language: � aː ɪ iː ʊ (sometimes: u) uː eː oː ɛː ɔː The vowel ''ʊ'' may be realized as a short ''u'' and the vowel ''ɪ'' may be realized as a short ''i''. The vowel ''ɛː'' is often realized as the diphthong ''əiː'' based and context or as an ''æː'' based on the speaker's accent. The vowel ''ɔː'' is often realized as the diphthong ''əuː'' based and context. Nazalized vowels occur word finally in Dhakti, they are: �ː ẽː ɛ̃ː ɑ̃ː ɔ̃ː õː ũː

Samples

A few of the typical sentences in Dhatki are: * "What are you doing?", "I am reading this Page.", * "What is your name?", * "I have to eat" ''(Literally translates to "I have to eat

roti Roti (also known as chapati) is a round flatbread native to the Indian subcontinent. It is popular in India, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh, Maldives, Myanmar, Malaysia, Indonesia, Singapore, Thailand, Guyana, Suriname, Jamaica, Trinid ...

)''. * "where are you going? "Nowhere.", * "How are you?". "I am Fine", -"who are you?"

Writing System

The language uses two major writing systems. In India, the

Devanagari Devanagari ( ; , , Sanskrit pronunciation: ), also called Nagari (),Kathleen Kuiper (2010), The Culture of India, New York: The Rosen Publishing Group, , page 83 is a left-to-right abugida (a type of segmental Writing systems#Segmental syste ...

script (which is also used for Marwari,

Hindi Hindi (Devanāgarī: or , ), or more precisely Modern Standard Hindi (Devanagari: ), is an Indo-Aryan language spoken chiefly in the Hindi Belt region encompassing parts of northern, central, eastern, and western India. Hindi has been de ...

and many other north Indian languages) is employed; whereas is in Pakistan, the Sindhi script is used. Some mercantile families, particularly on the Indian side of the border use their own scripts, usually variations of the

Mahajani Mahajani is a Laṇḍā mercantile script that was historically used in northern India for writing accounts and financial records in Marwari, Hindi and Punjabi. It is a Brahmic script and is written left-to-right. Mahajani refers to the Hin ...

script.

References

{{Languages of Pakistan Languages of Rajasthan Languages of Sindh