Language Information

One of the Iranian Language, Baluchi is a major language of south-west Pakistan, where it has over 2 million speakers and can claim nearly a million speakers in south-east Iran. There are about 200,000 Baluchi speakers in Afghanistan where it is recognised as a 'national language'.

The name BALUCHI or BALOCHI is not found before the 10th Century. It is believed that the language was brought to its present location in a series of migrations from Northern Iran, near the Caspian Shores.There are Brahui loanwords in Baluchi, it also contains loanwords from Persian and Sindhi - its eastern nieghbour.

Rakshani is the major dialect group in terms of numbers. Sarhaddi, is a sub dialect of Rakshani. Other sub - dialects are kalati, Chagai-kharani, Panjguri. Eastern Hill Baluchi or Northern Baluchi is very different from the rest. It was the very first dialect that became familiar to the British in India, and is thus particularly well documented in older linguistic work.

Afghanistan, Iran, Pakistan.

Family: Indo-European
Subgroup: Indo-Iranian
Branch: Iranian