Dehwari (, Dehwārī) is a southwestern

Persian language Persian ( ), also known by its endonym and exonym, endonym Farsi (, Fārsī ), is a Western Iranian languages, Western Iranian language belonging to the Iranian languages, Iranian branch of the Indo-Iranian languages, Indo-Iranian subdivision ...

spoken by 19,000 Dehwar people in Balochistan,

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as of 2018. Most of the Dehwari speakers are concentrated in Mastung, Khuzdar, Nushk, Kharan, Sarlath District, Dalbandin, and Kalat.

Influence on Brahui

Dehwari was introduced to the Brahui in the seventeenth century and the modern-day language uses many Dehwari loanwords in its vocabulary.

Brahui influence

In turn, Brahui has heavily influenced the language, which has made Dehwari a Persian dialect containing heavy Brahui ( Dravidian) adstratum. This has made Dehwari speakers bilingual in both Dehwari and Brahui, and some in Balochi,

Urdu Urdu (; , , ) is an Indo-Aryan languages, Indo-Aryan language spoken chiefly in South Asia. It is the Languages of Pakistan, national language and ''lingua franca'' of Pakistan. In India, it is an Eighth Schedule to the Constitution of Indi ...

, and even English.

Drop in Speakers

The drop of speakers in Dehwari was recorded in the 1921 Indian Census, with Pashto facing the same consequences in Kalat and Mastung. And in the 1931 Indian Census, the Dehwari population outside of Kalat and Mastung was only 1,795.

References

Languages of Balochistan, Pakistan Persian dialects and varieties Persian language in Pakistan {{IndoEuropean-lang-stub