Saraiki people

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The Saraikis (Saraiki: سرائیکی) are a group of Indo-Aryan communities native to central Pakistan, primarily identifying with Saraiki language and a shared regional identity. Mostly inhabiting southern Punjab and northern Sindh, as well as most of Derajat, located where southwestern Punjab, southeastern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, and northeastern Balochistan meet, the Saraiki regional identity arose in the 1960s, separating itself from the broader Punjabi ethnic identity; this was a result of a political movement, arising in 1962, to separate the Derawali, Multani and Riasti dialects from the Punjabi language, and to instead declare them to constitute a separate language for which the term Saraiki was adopted, hitherto only used for a Sindhi dialect spoken in northern Sindh. The Saraikis follow several religions, though most are predominantly followers of Sunni Islam. A small minority of Saraikis follows Christianity in Pakistan. There used to be a large Hindu and Sikh minority, however majority...

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