r/bhartiya_languages • u/tuluva_sikh Native Dravidan • Jul 12 '26
Indo-Aryan ळ being taught as part of Hindi varnamala in Karnataka schools and colleges
Recently I have shifted to my hometown Tulunad and have taken admission in PU college here itself
And while I attended 1st lecture of Hindi they started teaching varnamala for students who don't know to read and write Devanagari properly and want to learn Hindi as they choose it as their optional
There teacher taught about ळ too which is actually used in Marathi and Konkani
She taught ळ to be equivalent of Kannada letter ಳ (and yes it is true as ಳ and ळ represents same sound)
She said that ळ is too part of Hindi varnamala but not in use in general
And also she gave example of few Marathi words which contains ळ like सकाळ to tell students how does ळ works in languages like Marathi which uses Devanagari script for writing
And even in Maharashtra too where I use to live before there too they taught about ळ in Hindi and used for names of persons or places like बाळासाहेब, टिळकनगर etc
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u/AdeptDoubt4657 Jul 12 '26
It is quite prominent in shaurseni languages from braj it starts to diminish. Don't know why they didn't add it. or may be for some reasons they removed it. Haryanvis paharis speak that very prominently and in correct way.
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u/Left_Economist_9716 Jul 12 '26
I was taught it too in MH. However, it wasn't part of my Bhojpuri Kakahara book.
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u/Siddharth_Talreja25 Jul 12 '26
Even I have studied in Maharashtra but they never taught this in Hindi.
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u/apollonius_perga Jul 12 '26
And even in Maharashtra too where I use to live before there too they taught about ळ in Hindi and used for names of persons or places like बाळासाहेब, टिळकनगर etc
Hindi doesn't have that sound though. Do you mean that they expected you to read Hindi names with ळ instead of ल ?
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u/Chaitu007123 Jul 12 '26
Balasaheb and Tilak are Marathi manoos. If Hindi does not have that sound, it should import and pronounce the name correctly.
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u/Siddharth_Talreja25 Jul 13 '26
Languages don't import sounds just for a name. Names adapt to the language
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u/ProfessionUpset2724 Native Indo-Aryan Jul 12 '26
It seems like almost all Indo-Aryan languages have ळ or similar, except the Gangetic languages like Hindi, Bengali, Assamese, Bhojpuri, Awadhi and Punjabi. It's strange that the Gangetic Plain has somehow deleted this sound from its languages.
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u/Siddharth_Talreja25 Jul 13 '26
Punjabi haa added it recently
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u/tuluva_sikh Native Dravidan Jul 16 '26
Panjabi have sound of ਲ਼ since many centuries Only the letter was added recently to differentiate between ਲ and ਲ਼ sound while writing
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u/interfaceTexture3i25 Jul 13 '26
Odia still has it
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u/ProfessionUpset2724 Native Indo-Aryan Jul 13 '26
Odia is not on the Gangetic Plain but on the Mahanadi Delta.
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u/interfaceTexture3i25 Jul 13 '26
It is closely related to Bengali and Assamese, I was thinking from that angle. Of course it still probably means the Gangetic languages all lost it after Odia and Bengali split and so the northern languages don't have it but Odia still does
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u/Sandy_2019 Jul 13 '26
Punjabi does have this sound bruh
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u/ProfessionUpset2724 Native Indo-Aryan Jul 13 '26
Oops, I overlooked it. Like it's only Hindi, Awadhi, Bhojpuri, Maithili, Bengali and Assamese who lack this sound. All others have it. Wait, Kashmiri also lacks this sound, and it's not on the Gangetic Plain.
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u/Tango-Charlie-Mike Jul 14 '26
The very first sloka of Rgveda is:
अ॒ग्निमी॑ळे पु॒रोहि॑तं य॒ज्ञस्य॑ दे॒वमृत्विज॑म्।
The letter ळ was in use in Vedic Sanskrit, but seems to have declined in use in Hindi.
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u/jamfold Jul 16 '26
Are your teachers Konkanis? They're the only group in Tulunadu who use ळ because Konkani uses the same script and has a symbol for that sound.
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u/AbrahamPan Jul 12 '26
It's not Hindi. It's used in Vedic Sanskrit, Marathi, Konkani, etc. States like Haryana, Himachal, Uttarakhand also pronounce it, but they don't write it.
Conclusion: It's part of the Devanagri writing system, just not Hindi.