Canadians love hockey, to the extent that it has been referred to as a national religion. The number of Punjabi speakers who have migrated from South East Asia into Canada has been estimated to be 1.1 million. This gave the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation the idea of coming up with a weekly Hockey Night in Canada Show, and reproduce a Punjabi version of it. The Punjabi language is the third most popular language in Canada after English and French.
Punjabi is a language that is mainly spoken in the Indian state of Punjab. It is also an official language that is spoken in Pakistan. It is the most widely spoken mother tongue language in Pakistan. It is an Indic language that falls under the Indo European group of languages. It is also spoken in Afganistan, Canada, UK, UAE and USA. Aproximately 105 million people speak the language worldwide. This makes it the 13th most widely spoken language in the world. The Punjabi language is the official language that is used by most Sikhs, especially when carrying out various ceremonies. The Punjabi language was developed from the ancient Sanskrit language. Punjabi is a tonal language. It has 3 different tones. This includes a mid tone, a deep rising tone and a high falling tone. The tones are used to differentiate words that would otherwise have been identical. This makes it quite challenging for individuals who are trying to learn the language to grasp it. The Punjabi language has different dialects. The Mahji dialect is considered to be the most prestigious dialects of all.
Other alternative names for Punjabi include Lahnda, Mirpuri, Lahanda, Gurmukhi, Lahndi, Panjabi, Gurumukhi. The written Punjabi language is known as Mahji in both India and Pakistan. In India, the Punjabi language is written using the Gurmukhi alphabet, while in Pakistan it is written using the Urdu alphabet, which is known as Shahmukhi. The Devanagari script is also used at times. Punjabi is written using a syllabic alphabet. The direction of writing is from left to right in horizontal lines. Diactrics are used together with consonants so as to change the inherent vowel.