"We should stop treating technology as our enemy. Urdu needs to be inculcated into the youth and technology plays a very important role in it," says Amjad Islam Amjad, an Urdu poet, drama writer and lyricist from Pakistan.
According to Amjad, the use of technology can can be used to create a space, which could be used for propagating the language, and thus enable the future generation to relate to it.
"Urdu is growing at a very fast pace. But Urdu script is shrinking at an alarming rate and it needs to be preserved. Urdu script is like a seed and the language can only be protected if the script is protected," says Amjad.
The poet said there was a diminished interaction of the new generation with the Urdu language and pointed out that usually a language gradually fades out of existence once the existence of the script ends.
Another poet from Pakistan said there was need to spread
awareness on how to propagate the language and the script.
"Social media is very active, so Urdu language can be propagated through that medium, spreading awareness over how Urdu connects people," says Pirzada Qasim, an Urdu poet from Pakistan.
According to renowned poet Wasim Barelvi, Urdu is adapting with technology and Urdu poems propagates the language.
"Urdu is existing beautifully because it knows how to adapt, it changes forms and with time changes itself," says Barelvi.
Other languages are shrinking because they were not adaptable. And there is no danger to Urdu script as people will go to the source of the language and the language exists only through the script.
Another factor that is leading to the popularity of the language is the fact that now Urdu is getting written in Roman and Devnagiri form.
Kamna Prasad, Urdu activist and founder of the non-profit Jashn-e-Bahar Trust says Urdu is spreading through the Roman and Devnagiri script.
"The most important thing is that Urdu is spreading through these scripts and that is what we should keep in mind," she says.
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