The Punjabi-Speaking Community in Australia
Punjabi is widely spoken in most parts of Northern India and in a sizeable part of Pakistan. It's named after the region called the Punjab, which was divided between India and Pakistan during Partition in 1947. Punjab literally means land of five rivers; Punj meaning five and Aab, water.
The Punjabi language is closely associated with the Sikh religion. However, 80 per cent of Pakistanis speak Punjabi, regardless of their faith. Punjabi was used to record the teaching of the gurus, the ten founders of Sikhism, which is considered to be one of the world's youngest religions.
In India, Punjabi-speakers read and write the language in the Gurmukhi script, while in Pakistan the Persian script is used. However, there's no difference in the spoken form. Arrival and Settlement Some of the earliest Punjabi arrivals in Australia included Sardar Beer Singh, Johal who came in 1895 and Sardar Narain Singh Heyer, who arrived in 1898. Many Punjabis took part in the rush for gold on the Victorian fields while numbers of Muslims from North Western Punjab region worked as camel drivers in the Central Australian desert.
However, it wasn't until the 1970s that the Punjabi community began to grow. According to the 1996 Census, there are about 11,000 people who speak Punjabi at home, with Melbourne and Sydney accounting for nearly 6,500 of the population. However, there are many people who don't nominate Punjabi as their mother tongue, although they may use it frequently.
There are also many thousands of Punjabi-speaking students studying in Australia at any given time, who have come from India and Pakistan for higher education. The Punjabi community living in Australia is mostly a young and self-supporting community.
According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, 87% of Punjabis residing in Australia are aged under 50 and over 83% of the population are proficient in English.
As well as Sikhs, the community includes many Muslims, Hindus and a small number of Christians.
One of the more famous communities is the one located at Woolgoolga, on the north coast of New South Wales, which is made up of descendants of Sikh plantation workers.
Punjabis have a vibrant culture, elements of which are infiltrating contemporary western music. The pulsating Bhangra music, once restricted to celebrate the harvest throughout Northern India, is now making its presence felt in dance clubs around the world. Bhangra music frequently tops the charts in the United Kingdom, Canada and the South East Asia. More recently, it has started to strike roots in Australia as well.
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