Geographical distribution of Urdu speakers
Native speakers of Urdu are spread across South Asia. The vast majority of them are Muslims of the Hindi–Urdu Belt of northern India, followed by the Deccani people of the Deccan plateau in south-central India, and most of the Muhajir people of Pakistan and some stranded Pakistani communities in Bangladesh. The historical centres of Urdu speakers include Delhi and Lucknow.
History
From the early Muslim kingdoms developed Indian Muslim clan-groups who were well-rooted social groups that acted as warrior lineages providing court officers and military soldiers. These evolving communities or tribes played a key role in providing a local Muslim leadership. The language developed at the time of Sultans of Dehli due to the mixture of people, likely to be soldiers, from Turkish, Arabic, Persian, Afghan and Indian background.Mughal Empire
As early as 1689, Europeans used the label "Moors dialect", which simply meant "Muslim", to describe Urdu, the language associated with the Muslims in North India, such as John Ovington, who visited India during the reign of Mughal emperor Aurangzeb:The language of the Moors is different from that of the ancient original inhabitants of India, but is oblig'd to these Gentiles for its characters. For though the Moors dialect is peculiar to themselves, yet it is destitute of Letters to express it; and therefore in all their Writings in their Mother Tongue, they borrow their letters from the Heathens, or from the Persians, or other Nations.
Fall of the Mughal Empire
The Upper Doab and Rohilkhand was dominated by a literate and homogenous elite, who embraced a distinctive Indo-Persian style of culture. This service gentry, performing both clerical and military service for the Mughal empire and its successor states, provided cultural and literary patronage that continued, even after the political decline, to act as preservers of Indo-Persian traditions and values.The end of Muslim rule saw a large number of unemployed Indian Muslim horsemen, who were employed in the army of the East India Company. Thus 75% of the cavalry branch of the British army was composed of a social group referred to as the "Hindustani Mahomedans". This included Indian Muslim Baradaris of the Urdu-Hindustani Belt such as the Ranghar, Sheikhs, Sayyids, Mughals, and Indianized Pathans. British officers such as Skinner, Gardner and Hearsay had become leaders of irregular cavalry that preserved the traditions of Mughal cavalry, which had a political purpose because it absorbed pockets of cavalrymen who might otherwise become disaffected plunderers. The Governor-general insisted that it was incumbent upon the British to "give military employment" to various north Indian Muslim soldiers, particularly those "formerly engaged in military service of the Native powers". The lingua franca spoken in the army was a form of Urdu referred to in colonial usage as "military Hindustani".
The Indian Rebellion of 1857 was initiated by the 3rd Bengal Light Cavalry in Meerut, which was composed mainly of Indian Muslims. The mutineers made for Delhi, where its garrison revolted, massacring its British population, and installed Bahadur Shah Zafar as its nominal leader. The spread of the word that the British had been expelled from Delhi, interpreted as the breakdown of British authority, acted as a catalyst for mutiny as well as revolt. Regiments in other parts of northern India only revolted after Delhi had fallen. British characterisations of Muslims as fanatics took the fore during and after the Great Rebellion, as well as produced the Indian Muslims as a unified, cogent group, who were easily agitated, aggressive, and inherently disloyal.
Urdu nationalism
Even in later days, the same clans were dominant groups in the associations in the defence of Urdu and district Muslim Leagues which were among the first forays of Muslims into electoral and pressure-group politics. In the 19th century, Sir Syed Ahmed Khan and his followers such as Mohsin-ul-Mulk further advocated for the adoption of Urdu as the language of Indian Muslims, and led organisations such as the Anjuman-i Taraqqi-i Urdu and Urdu Defence Association, which won popular support in the Aligarh Movement and the Deoband Movement. It was made the official language of British India in 1825 and got large opposition from the Hindus and thus sparking the Hindi-Urdu controversy in 1867. This resulted in Sir Syed's Two Nation Theory in 1868. The Urdu language was used in the emergence of a political Muslim self-consciousness. Syed Ahmed Khan converted the existing cultural and religious entity among Indian Muslims into a separatist political force, throwing a Western cloak of nationalism over the Islamic concept of culture. Furthermore, in 2008 Syed Nadeem Ahmed brought forward the idea of Urdu Nationalism by presenting his idea of an "Urdu Qaum" based on Urdu language and culture. The distinct sense of value, culture and tradition among Indian Muslims originated from the nature of Islamification of the Indian populace during the Muslim conquests in the Indian subcontinent.Demographics
Although the majority of Urdu-speakers reside in Pakistan, where Urdu is the national and official language, most speakers who use Urdu as their native tongue live in northern India, where it is one of 22 official languages.The Urdu-speaking community is also present in other parts of the subcontinent with a historical Muslim presence, such as the Deccanis, the Biharis and Dhakaiyas in Bangladesh, the Urdu-speaking members of the Madheshi community in Nepal, some Muslims in Sri Lanka and a section of Burmese Indians.
In addition, there are Urdu-speakers present among the South Asian diaspora, most notably in the Middle East, North America, Europe, the Caribbean region, Africa, Southeast Asia and Oceania.