Saraiki alphabet

There are three writing systems for Saraiki, though very few Saraiki speakers—even those literate in other languages—are able to read or write Saraiki in any writing system.

Arabic script

The most common Saraiki writing system today is the Perso-Arabic script, which has also been adapted for use on computers. Saraiki has a 45-letter alphabet including 39 of the Urdu alphabet and six letters unique to Saraiki. The Saraiki keyboard can also be used for other languages such as Standard dialect of Punjabi & Kashmiri. The Devanagari and Gurmukhi scripts, written from left to right, were used by Sikhs and Hindus. Though not used in present-day Pakistan, there are still emigrant speakers in India who know the Devanagari or Gurmukhi scripts for Saraiki. Traders or bookkeepers wrote in a script known as Langdi, although use of this script has been significantly reduced in recent times. Likewise, a script related to the Landa scripts family, known as Multani, was previously used to write Saraiki.Preliminary Proposal to Encode the Multani Script in ISO/IEC 10646 is submitted by Anshuman Pandey, on 26-04-2011. Saraiki Unicode has been approved in 2005.

Here is an example of Saraiki poetry by Khwaja Ghulam Farid: Saraiki: اپڑیں ملک کوں آپ وسا توں ۔ پٹ انگریزی تھانے The transliteration from and to Persian and Devanagari scripts for Saraiki language can be made online.

Saraiki diacritics

• (ئ ؤ and stand alone ء) hamza: indicates a glottal stop.
• ḥarakāt (In Arabic: حركات also called تشكيل tashkīl):
  • (ــَـ) fatḥa (a)
  • (ــِـ) kasra (i)
  • (ــُـ) ḍamma (u)
  • (ــْـ) sukūn (no vowel)
• (ــٰـ) superscript alif (also "short" or "dagger alif": A replacement for an original alif that is dropped in the writing out of some rare words, e.g. لاكن is not written out with the original alif found in the word pronunciation, instead it is written out as لٰكن.
• (ــّـ) shadda: Gemination (doubling) of consonants.
• (--ٖ--) arabic subscript alef (U+0656), KhaRRi Zeer
• (___ٗ__) Inverted Zamma , Ulti Pesh , Such as in : کٗرتا، مٗردا
• Tanween

ـٌ  ـٍ  ـً

• • (__ً_) ݙو زبر
  • (ٍ--) ݙو زیر
  • (____) ݙو پیش

Saraiki numerals

The Saraiki numerals (also called Arabic–Indic numerals and Arabic Eastern numerals) are the symbols (٠‎ ١‎ ٢‎ ٣‎ ٤‎ ٥‎ ٦‎ ٧‎ ٨‎ ٩‎) used to represent the Hindu–Arabic numeral system in conjunction with the Arabic alphabet in the countries of the Arab east, and its variant in other languages and countries.

Hindu–Arabic	0	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9
Saraiki	٠	١	٢	٣	٤	٥	٦	٧	٨	٩

Devanagari script

In India, the Devanagari script is also used to write Saraiki. A modern version was introduced by the government of India in 1948; however, it did not gain full acceptance, so both the Saraiki-Arabic and Devanagari scripts are used. In India a person may write a Sindhi language paper for a Civil Services Examination in either script [1]. Diacritical bars below the letter are used to mark implosive consonants, and dots called nukta are used to form other additional consonants.

अ	आ	इ	ई	उ	ऊ	ए	ऐ	ओ	औ
ə	a	ɪ	i	ʊ	uː	e	ɛ	o	ɔ
क	ख	ख़	ग	ॻ	ग़		घ		ङ
k	kʰ	x	ɡ	ɠ	ɣ		ɡʱ		ŋ
च	छ		ज	ॼ	ज़		झ		ञ
c	cʰ		ɟ	ʄ	z		ɟʱ		ɲ
ट	ठ		ड	ॾ	ड़		ढ	ढ़	ण
ʈ	ʈʰ		ɖ	ɗ	ɽ		ɖʱ	ɽʱ	ɳ
त	थ		द				ध		न
t	tʰ		d				dʱ		n
प	फ	फ़	ब	ॿ			भ		म
p	pʰ	f	b	ɓ			bʱ		m
य	र	ल	व
j	r	l	ʋ
श	ष	स	ह
ʃ	ʂ	s	h

Roman script

Romanization is often termed "transliteration", but this is not technically correct. Transliteration is the direct representation of foreign letters using Latin symbols, while most systems for romanizing Arabic are actually transcription systems, which represent the sound of the language. As an example, the above rendering munāẓaratu l-ḥurūfi l-ʻarabīyah of the Arabic: مناظرة الحروف العربية‎‎ is a transcription, indicating the pronunciation; an example transliteration would be mnaẓrḧ alḥrwf alʻrbyḧ. For Saraiki all letters and symbols are in use, This is called Saraiki in latin script.

External links

• Download Saraiki font and keyboard for Windows and Android
• Saraiki Keyboard in Roman