Brahui Language Services

Brahui (/brəˈhuːi/; Brahui: براہوئی) is a northern Dravidian language spoken primarily by the Brahui people in the central part of Balochistan Province, in Pakistan and in scattered parts of Iran, Afghanistan and Turkmenistan and by expatriate Brahui communities in Iraq, Qatar and United Arab Emirates. It is isolated from the nearest Dravidian-speaking neighbour population of South India by a distance of more than 1,500 kilometres (930 mi). The Kalat, Khuzdar, Mastung, Quetta, Bolan, Nasirabad, Nushki, and Kharan districts of Balochistan Province are predominantly Brahui-speaking. Brahui is also spoken in Sindh, mostly in Larkana and Nawabshah divisions.

Brahui is spoken in the central part of Pakistani Balochistan, mainly in Kalat, Khuzdar and Mastung districts, but also in smaller numbers in neighboring districts, as well as in Afghanistan which borders Pakistani Balochistan; however, many members of the ethnic group no longer speak Brahui. There are also an unknown very small number of expatriate Brahuis in the Arab States of the Persian Gulf, Iranian Balochistan and Turkmenistan.

There is no consensus as to whether Brahui is a relatively recent language introduced into Balochistan or the remnant of a formerly more widespread Dravidian language family. According to Josef Elfenbein (1989), the most common theory is that the Brahui were part of a Dravidian migration into north-western India in the 3rd millennium BC, but unlike other Dravidians who migrated to the south, they remained in Sarawan and Jahlawan since before 2000 BC. However, some other scholars see it as a recent migrant language to its present region. They postulate that Brahui could only have migrated to Balochistan from central India after 1000 AD. This is contradicted by genetic evidence that shows the Brahui population to be indistinguishable from neighbouring Balochi speakers, and genetically distant from central Dravidian speakers. The main Iranian contributor to Brahui vocabulary, Balochi, is a Northwestern Iranian language, and moved to the area from the west only around 1000 AD, One scholar places the migration as late as the 13th or 14th century.

Southworth (2012) proposes that Brahui is not a Dravidian language, but can be linked with the remaining Dravidian languages and Elamite to form the “Zagrosian family” which originated in Southwest Asia (southern Iran) and was widely distributed in South Asia and parts of eastern West Asia before the Indo-Aryan migration.

There are no important dialectal differences. Jhalawani (southern, centered on Khuzdar) and Sarawani (northern, centered on Kalat) dialects are distinguished by the pronunciation of *h, which is retained only in the north (Elfenbein 1997). Brahui has been influenced by the Iranian languages spoken in the area, including Persian, Balochi and Pashto.