Hindko

Hindko (ہندکو IPA: [ˈɦɪnd̪koː]) is a cover term for a diverse group of Lahnda dialects spoken by several million people of various ethnic backgrounds in several areas in northwestern Pakistan, primarily in parts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Punjab.

There is a nascent language movement, and in recent decades Hindko-speaking intellectuals have started promoting the view of Hindko as a separate language. There is a literary tradition based on Peshawari, the urban variety of Peshawar in the northwest, and another one based on the language of Abbottabad in the northeast. In the 2017 census of Pakistan, 5.1 million people declared their language to be Hindko, while a 2020 estimate placed the number of speakers at 7 million.

Hindko to some extent is mutually intelligible with Punjabi and Saraiki, and has more affinities with the latter than with the former. Differences with other Punjabi varieties are more pronounced in the morphology and phonology than in the syntax. In a sense both Hindko, as well as other Lahnda varieties, and Standard Panjabi are "dialects" of a "Greater Punjabi" macrolanguage.

The word Hindko, commonly used to refer to a number of Indo-Aryan dialects spoken in the neighbourhood of Pashto, likely originally meant "the Indian language" (in contrast to Pashto). An alternative local name for this language group is Hindki. A speaker of Hindko may be referred to as Hindki, Hindkun, or Hindkowan (Hindkuwan).

Like other Lahnda varieties, Hindko is derived from the Shauraseni Prakrit.

Due to the effects of dominant languages in the Pakistani media such as Urdu, Standard Punjabi and English and the religious impact of Arabic and Persian, Hindko like other regional varieties of Pakistan is continuously expanding its vocabulary base with loan words.