Hijra Farsi

Hijra Farsi
Hijra Farsi
Native to	India, Pakistan
Native speakers	Unknown (2017)
Language family	Indo-European Indo-Iranian Indo-Aryan Central Zone (Hindi) Western Hindi Hindustani Hijra Farsi; ; ; ; ; ;
Language codes
ISO 639-3	None (mis)
Glottolog	None

Hijra Farsi is a secret language spoken by South-Asian Hijra and Kothi (also Koti) communities. Hijras are a marginalized transgender community that lives in sequestered groups in many cities of India and Pakistan. The language, also known as Koti Farsi, is spoken by the Hijra community throughout Pakistan and North India. The language is based on Hindustani and not Farsi, as suggested by the name. The sentence structure is similar to Urdu, but noticeable distinctions exist. Hijra Farsi is mainly spoken by Muslim Hijras; Hindu Hijras speak the Gupti language and its regional dialects.

Even though the language is not actually based on Persian (Farsi), the hijras consider the language to be related to the language of the Mughal Empire, which they associate with the origin of Hijra identity. Hijra Farsi is most similar to Hindi, but is not intelligible to Hindi speakers due to distinctive intonation and a large amount of distinctive vocabulary.

After the partition of India, the language has come to include words of local languages including Punjabi, Saraiki, Sindhi and other languages.

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