Episode Details

Most Indian languages share the same phonetic structure and yet have vastly different scripts, making communication across languages difficult. Moreover, each script has its own peculiarities steepening the learning curve for adults and children alike. To tackle this challenge, a team at IIT Madras designed a novel and technology-friendly Indic script — Bharati — that can be used to write in multiple Indian languages. In this Puliyabaazi, we speak to two members from the Bharati Team — Prof V Srinivasa Chakravarthy and Anubhooti Soni — about Indian languages, their similarities, and the need for a common script.

भारत की भिन्न-भिन्न भाषाओँ को एक चीज़ जोड़ती है - उनकी मूलभूत संरचना. इसके बावजूद हमारी भाषाओं की लिपियाँ कम ही मेल खाती है. इस वजह से एक दुसरे की भाषाएँ समझना और सीखना मुश्किल हो जाता है. इसी चुनौती को सुलझाने के लिए IIT मद्रास की एक टीम ने एक ऐसी लिपि का ईजाद किया है जिसके ज़रिए भारत की हर प्रमुख भाषा को लिखा-पढ़ा जा सकता है. इस पुलियाबाज़ी में चर्चा इसी दिलचस्प विषय पर.

For more:

1. One Billion People. One Script. TEDx Talk by Srinivasa Chakravarthy

2. Video: Bharati Script: Short, Sweet and Fast-Paced

3. Video: Bharati: The Unified Indian Script

4. Bharati Webpage: https://bharatiscript.wordpress.com/genesis/

5. Android Apps for Bharati: Bharati Keyboard, Bharati Handwriting Keyboard, Bharati Jumble Tumble, and Bharati Transliterator

6. Bharati Primers: Bodo, Kannada, Tamil, Sanskrit

7. Transliterated works: Hindi, Bengali, Tamil, Sanskrit

8. Puliyabaazi #71 with Abhishek Avtans on Hindi-Urdu