What Is Punjab?

[panj pyare]

Punjab is land of five rivers in North West India and North East Pakistan. Punj means five and aab means water, so punjab means five waters. These five rivers that run through punjab, having their originating source as various small lakes in Himalayas. If one were to go across the Punjab starting from Delhi and to Afghanistan, the rivers are in this order. Beus, Satluj, Ravi, Chenab and Jhelum. Beus, and Satluj merge into one river retaining the name Satluj at Harike near Ferozepur in Punjab just before crossing the border into west Punjab (Pakistan) and eventually merging into river Indus.

Area of Punjab that is between rivers of Beus and Satluj is called Doaba, major cities in this part of punjab are Jalandhar, Hoshiarpur and Nawan Shahr. Majha is between Beus and Chenab and on both sides of Ravi, this part is called the heart of Punjab and cities include, Lahore, Amritsar, Gurdaspur, Sialkote, Kasur, Lyallpur(Faisalabad), Faridkot and Ferozepur. In Majha part of Punjab many new cities were developed by converting the forests into cultivating land and is called Bar, cities include Lyallpur (Faisalabad), Montgomery, etc. Area beyond Chenab river in North and around river Jhelum is called Pothohar, cities include Rawalpindi, Hasan Abdal, etc. Area between Ravi and Chenab river is called Rachna doab cities are Gujrat, Sargodha, etc. Area of Malwa is southern Punjab facing Rajasthan and East of river Beus, cities include Ludhiana, Patiala, Ambala, Karnal, Sangrur, Malerkotla, Shahabad, and Abohar.

Punjabi civilization is one of the oldest on earth, with its distinguished language, culture, food, attire, script, folklore, people, etc. Punjabi langauge has its originating source in Sanskrit (not Hindi or Urdu as many young Indian pakistanis believe), i.e. the family of Indo-European group of langauges which includes Persian and Latin. Punjab has always been land of great saints and fighters. In 450 B.C (2450 years ago) Alexander invaded Punjab and conquered a great Punjabi king named Porus whose kingdom was on the banks of river Chenab. He did not accepted defeat and asked Greek king to show him the same respect as kings. He was restored back to his throne by Alexander. Alexander returned to Greece right before crossing the river Beus, as his forces refused to fight. In his train we have a reliable resource that tells us about Punjab 2450 years ago. Not much different from today (except for the technology).