Roman Urdu
Roman Urduis the name used for theUrdulanguage written with theLatin script,also known as Roman script.
According to the Urdu scholar Habib R. Sulemani: "Roman Urdu is strongly opposed by the traditionalArabic scriptlovers. Despite this opposition it is still used by most on the internet and computers due to limitations of most technologies as they do not have the Urdu script. Although, this script is under development and thus the net users are using the Roman script in their own ways. Popular websites likeJang Grouphave devised their own schemes for Roman Urdu. This is of great advantage for those who are not able to read the Arabic script. MSN, Yahoo and some desi-chat-rooms are working as laboratories for the evolving new script and language (Roman Urdu). "[1]
Romanized Urdu is mutually intelligible withRomanized Hindiin informal contexts, unlike Urdu written in theUrdu Alpha betand Hindi inDevanagari.Multinational corporations often use it as a cost effective method for printing and advertising in order to market their products in both Pakistan and India.
Although the idea of romanising Urdu had been suggested several times, it was GeneralAyub Khanwho most seriously suggested adopting the Latin Alpha bet for Urdu and all Pakistani languages during his rule of the country.[2][3][4]The suggestion was inspired to an extent byMustafa Kemal Atatürk's adoption of the Latin Alpha bet for TurkishinTurkey.
In India, where the Devanagari script is used, Roman Urdu was widely used in theIndian Army,as well as in Christian mission schools, especially for translations of the Bible.[5]
TheHunterian transliterationsystem mostly avoids diacritics and non-standard characters.
Sample texts
[edit]Zabu'r 23Dáúd ká Mazmúr
[edit]
Roman Urdu
[edit]Urdu Bible
1Khudáwandmerá chaupán hai; mujhe kamí na hogí.
2Wuh mujhe harí harí charágáhoṉ meṉ bithátá hai: Wuh mujhe ráhat ke chashmoṉ ke pás le játá hai.
3Wuh merí ján bahál kartá hai: Wuh mujhe apne nám kí khátir sadáqat kí ráhon par le chaltá hai.
4Balki khwáh maut ke sáye kí wádí meṉ se merá guzar ho, Maiṉ kisí balá se nahíṉ darúṉgá; kyúnkṉki tú mere sáth hai: Tere 'asá aur terí láthí se mujhe tasallí hai.
5Tú mere dushmanoṉ ke rúbarú mere áge dastarkhwán bichhátá hai: Tú ne mere sir par tel malá hai, merá piyála labrez hotá hai.
6Yaqínan bhalái aur rahmat 'umr bhar mere sáth sáth raheṉgí: Aur maiṉ hameshaKhudáwandke ghar meṉ sukúnat karúṉgá.[6]
Nastaʿlīq (Perso-Arabic) Script
[edit]۱خداوندمیرا چوپان ہے؛ مجھے کمی نہ ہوگی۔
۲وہ مجھے ہری ہری چراگاہوں میں بٹھاتا ہے: وہ مجھے راحت کے چشموں کے پاس لے جاتا ہے۔
۳وہ میری جان بحال کرتا ہے: وہ مجھے اپنے نام کی خاطر صداقت کی راہوں پر لے چلتا ہے۔
۴بلکہ خواہ موت کے سایے کی وادی میں سے میرا گزر ہو، میں کسی بلا سے نہیں ڈروں گا؛ کیونکہ تو میرے ساتھ ہے: تیرے عصا اور تیری لاٹھی سے مجھے تسلی ہے۔
۵تو میرے دشمنوں کے روبرو میرے آگے دسترخوان بچھاتا ہے: تو نے میرے سر پر تیل ملا ہے، میرا پیالہ لبریز ہوتا ہے۔
۶یقیناً بھلائی اور رحمت عمر بھر میرے ساتھ ساتھ رہیں گی: اور میں ہمیشہخداوندکے گھر میں سکونت کروں گا۔(کتاب مقدس کے زبور۲۳از داؤد)
Devanāgarī script
[edit]१ख़ुदावन्दमेरा चौपान है; मुझे कमी ना होगी.
२वो मुझे हरी हरी चरागाहों में बिठाता है. वो मुझे राहत के चश्मों के पास ले जाता है.
३वो मेरी जान बहाल करता है. वो मुझे अपने नाम की ख़ातिर सदाक़त की राहों पर ले चलता है.
४बलके ख़्वाह मौत के साये की वादी में से मेरा गुज़र हो, मैं किसी बला से नहीं ड़रूंगा; क्योंके तू मेरे साथ है. तेरे असा और तेरी लाठी से मुझे तसल्ली है.
५तू मेरे दुश्मनों के रूबरू मेरे आगे दस्तर-ख़्वान बिछाता है. तू ने मेरे सर पर तेल मला है, मेरा पियाला लबरेज़ होता है.
६यक़ीनन भलाई और रहेमत उम्र-भर मेरे साथ साथ रहेंगी. और मैं हमेशा ख़ुदावन्द के घर में सुकूनत करूंगा.(किताब-ए मुक़द्दस के ज़बूर२३अज़ दाऊद)
Usage
[edit]Christian community in the Indian subcontinent
[edit]
Urduwas the dominant native language among Christians ofKarachi,Uttar Pradesh,andRajasthanin the 20th century and is still used today by some people in these states. Pakistani and Indian Christians often used the Roman script for writing Urdu. The Bible Society of India publishes Roman UrduBibles,which enjoyed sale late into the 1960s (though they are still published today). Church songbooks are also common in Roman Urdu. However, its usage in Christian contexts is declining in India with the wider use ofHindiandEnglishin the states.
Film industry
[edit]Bollywood,India's major film industry, uses a version of Roman script as the main script for its film titles. This is because Bollywood films have an appeal for viewers acrossSouth Asiaand even in theMiddle East.[7]TheDevanāgarīscript is used mostly by Hindi speakers while thePerso-Arabic scriptis used primarily by Urdu speakers. The language used in Bollywood films is often called Hindi, but most dialogues are actually written inHindustani—they can be understood by Urdu and Hindi speakers alike. Because the film industry wants to reach the largest possible audience, just using theDevanāgarīorPerso-Arabic scriptwould be unfavorable for the Bollywood industry as few individuals are literate in both scripts. For this reason, the neutralRomanscript is used forBollywoodfilm titles, though some films include the Hindi and Urdu scripts as well.[8]
The similar circumstances are also applied with Pakistan'sLollywoodfilming industry, where, along with the Urdu name or title of the movie, a Roman Urdu title is always provided for viewers.
Internet
[edit]Roman Urdu used on theInternetis non-standard and has irregular spelling. Users who use Roman Urdu on the Internet try to imitateEnglish orthography.In most cases they are unaware of the fact thatEnglishspelling is not always phonetic.[citation needed]
Romanization schemes
[edit]There are several Romanization standards for writingUrduamong them the most prominent areUddin and Begum Urdu-Hindustani Romanization,ALA-LC romanizationandArabTeX.
There are two main problems with existing Roman Urdu schemes. Either they are not reversible toUrdu scriptor they do not allow pronouncing the Urdu words properly. Another shortcoming is that a lot of Roman Urdu schemes confuse the Urdu letter 'Choti He' which has the sound ofvoiceless glottal fricativewith 'Do Chasham He' which is used as adigraphforaspirated consonantsin Urdu script. The digraphs "Sh" for letter Shin and "Zh" for letter Zhe also cause problems as they could be interpreted as the letter Sin and 'Choti He' or letter Ze and 'Choti He' respectively. Most Roman Urdu schemes also do not take much consideration of Urdu orthography and the spelling system.
Informal Roman Urdu
[edit]The system of Romanisation used most often by native speakers differs from the formal systems presented in most English language sources. It contains no diacritics or special characters, usually just the 26 letters of the core English Alpha bet. Informal Romanised Urdu is mutually intelligible withRomanised Hindiand the distinction between the languages can becontroversial.
While theUrdu Alpha betis derived from theArabic Alpha betinformal Romanised Urdu is less eccentric thaninformal Romanised Arabic.Informal Romanised Urdu does not use numerals, and rarely uses mixed case, because the Arabic letters that lack a clear equivalent in the English Latin Alpha bet (e.g.ء ع ذ ص ض ط ظ) are often silent in Urdu or pronounced identically toother letters(e.g.ت س ز). So, this system of Urdu Romanisation is used in some slightly more formal contexts thaninformal Romanised Arabic.
One example is the wordعورت,ʿaurat.Formal transliterations often include a punctuation mark (') or special character (ʻ) for the aynعbut this is omitted in informal romanization. Adding the special characters makes it harder to type and would cause things such as Twitter hashtags to break. The discussion on social media about these events is often in informal Romanised Urdu, with frequentcode-switchingbetween Urdu and English, but the handwritten or expertly typeset signs at the events are mostly in either English, Urdu in the traditional script, or local languages.
| Letter | Nasta‘liq | Name of letter | Informal transcription | IPA |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ا | ا | alif | a | /aː/ |
| ب | ب | be | b | /b/ |
| پ | پ | pe | p | /p/ |
| ت | ت | te | t | /t̪/ |
| ٹ | ٹ | ṭe | t | /ʈ/ |
| ث | ث | se | s | /s/ |
| ج | ج | jīm | j | /d͡ʒ/ |
| چ | چ | ce | ch | /t͡ʃ/ |
| ح | ح | baṛī he | h | /h/ |
| خ | خ | k͟he | kh | /x/ |
| د | د | dāl | d | /d̪/ |
| ڈ | ڈ | ḍāl | d | /ɖ/ |
| ذ | ذ | zāl | z | /z/ |
| ر | ر | re | r | /r/ |
| ڑ | ڑ | ṛe | ṛ | /ɽ/ |
| ز | ز | ze | z | /z/ |
| ژ | ژ | zhe | zh | /ʒ/ |
| س | س | sīn | s | /s/ |
| ش | ش | śīn | sh | /ʃ/ |
| ص | ص | ṣu’ād | s | /s/ |
| ض | ض | z̤ād | z | /z/ |
| ط | ط | to'e | t | /t/ |
| ظ | ظ | ẓo'e | z | /z/ |
| ع | ع | ʿain | ' or ‘ | /ʔ/[9] |
| غ | غ | ġain | gh | /ɣ/ |
| ف | ف | fe | f | /f/ |
| ق | ق | qāf | q | /q/ |
| ک | ک | kāf | k | /k/ |
| گ | گ | gāf | g | /ɡ/ |
| ل | ل | lām | l | /l/ |
| م | م | mīm | m | /m/ |
| ن | ن | nūn | n | /n/ |
| و | و | vā'o | v/w, o, au or ū | /ʋ/,/oː/,/ɔ/or/uː/ |
| ہ, ﮩ, ﮨ | ہ | choṭī he | h | /h/ |
| ھ | ھ | do chashmī he | h | /ʰ/ |
| ء | ء | hamza | ' | /ʔ/ |
| ی | ی | ye | y, i | /j/or/iː/ |
| ے | ے | bari ye | e or ai | /eː/or/ɛː/ |
See also
[edit]- Hindustani orthography
- Hindustani language
- Urdu
- Uddin and Begum Hindustani Romanisation
- Hindi
- Hindustan
- Pakistan
- India
- Christianity in Pakistan
Footnotes
[edit]- ^"1 - Number One News Resource of Pakistan - The News - Jang Group".1 March 2004. Archived fromthe originalon 1 March 2004.Retrieved27 September2022.
- ^Paving new paths to romanise Urdu script,Mushir Anwar,Dawn (newspaper),Nov 27, 2008
- ^The Urdu-English Controversy in Pakistan,Tariq Rahman,Modern Asian Studies,Vol. 31, No. 1 (Feb., 1997), pp. 177-207
- ^The Language Movement: An OutlineArchived2012-11-19 at theWayback Machine,Rafiqul Islam
- ^Fārūqī, Shamsurraḥmān (2001).Early Urdu Literary Culture and History.Oxford University Press.ISBN9780195652017.
- ^World Bible Translation Center (pdf file)
- ^Krishnamurthy, Rajeshwari (28 June 2013)."Kabul Diary: Discovering the Indian connection".Gateway House: Indian Council on Global Relations.Retrieved13 March2018.
Most Afghans in Kabul understand and/or speak Hindi, thanks to the popularity of Indian cinema in the country.
- ^Dwyer, Rachel (27 September 2006).Filming the Gods: Religion and Indian Cinema.Routledge. p. 103.ISBN9781134380701.
- ^"Urdu Phonetic Inventory"(PDF).cle.org.pk.Center for Language Engineering.Retrieved19 May2020.
Bibliography
[edit]- Dua, Hans R. (1994b).Urdu.In Asher (Ed.) (pp. 4863–4864).
- Insha, Ibn e. (2002)Urdu Ki Aakhri Kitab.New Delhi: Kitab Wala.ISBN81-85738-57-2.
- B.S.I.Kita'b I Muqaddas.Bangalore: The Bible Society of India, 1994.ISBN81-221-3230-8.
- Gupta, Sunil (2022).The Dictionary of Urdu Poetry.Gurgaon: Zorba Books.ISBN97-893-9302-9-13-3.
External links
[edit]
Urdu phrasebooktravel guide from Wikivoyage
Hindi phrasebooktravel guide from Wikivoyage
- The Urdu Latin Alpha betby Adnaan Mahmood