Learn Gurmukhi Alphabet

	ੳ oorhaa     Ou	ਅ  airhaa     Aa	ੲ  eerhee     Ie	ਸ  sassaa     Sa	ਹ haahaa     Ha
	ਕ kakkaa     Ka	ਖ khakhkhaa    Kha	ਗ gaggaa     Ga	ਘ ghaggaa    Gha	ਙ nganngaa    Nga
	ਚ chachchaa    Cha	ਛ chhachhchhaa   Chha	ਜ  jajjaa     Ja	ਝ  jhajjaa   Jha	ਞ njannjaa    Nja
	ਟ tainkaa    Ta	ਠ thaththaa   Tha	ਡ daddaa    Da	ਢ dhaddaa   Dha	ਣ nhaanhaa    Na
	ਤ tattaa    Ta	ਥ thaththaa   Tha	ਦ daddaa    Da	ਧ dhaddaa   Dha	ਨ nannaa    Na
	ਪ pappaa    Pa	ਫ phaphphaa   Pha	ਬ babbaa    Ba	ਭ bhabbaa   Bha	ਮ mammaa    Ma
	ਯ yayyaa    Ya	ਰ raaraa    Ra	ਲ lallaa    La	ਵ vavvaa    Va	ੜ rhaarhaa    Ra
	ਸ਼ shashashaa   Sha	ਖ਼ khhakhhkhha  Khha	ਗ਼ ghagghaa    Ga	ਜ਼ zazzaa    Za	ਫ਼  faffaa    Fa
	ਲ਼  lallaa    La	Listen to the full alphabet

Gurmukhi Alphabet

All letters of a script have three aspects. Every letter has a particular shape, particular name and it represent a particular sound. Sanskrit may have been one of the first languages to group the letters according to their sounds. At one time there were only thirty-five letters in the Gurmukhi script, but later, five more letters were added in order to accommodate other sounds correctly. This need arose because many lone words are used in Punjabi. More recently, an extra character ( ਲ਼ ) was introduced. The shape, name and sound of Gurmukhi alphabet is as above:

Note: ੳ, ਅ, ੲ are only vowel bearers. So they don't represent any sound independently except ਅ as mukta vowel.

It can also be noted that most of the characters have a horizontal line at the upper part. The characters are connected mostly by this line called head line to form a word. A letter in Gurmukhi script can be partitioned into three horizontal zones. The upper zone denotes the region above the head line, where the vowels reside, while the middle zone represents the area below the headline where the consonants and some sub-parts of vowels are present. The middle zone is the busiest zone. The lower zone represents the area below middle zone where some vowels and certain half-characters lie in the foot of consonants.

Three Zones Of Letters In Gurmukhi Script

It is quite possible to learn the characters of the Gurmukhi script and sounds of the language at the same time as, by and large, Punjabi is a phonetic language. It is more accurate to call the Punjabi writing system a syllabary because each character represents a syllable. It is important to note that two phonetic features of all North Indian Languages are the system of contrasts between aspirated and unaspirated consonants and the contrast between retroflex and dental consonants. These do not occur in English. Aspirated consonants are accompanied by an audible expulsion of breath, whereas non-aspirated consonants are those produced with minimal breath.

Letters With A Dot

It is also important to note the distinction between plain letters and those letters which are marked by a dot, as shown below:

sa	sha	kha	ḵẖa	ga	ġa	ja	za	pha	fa	la	ḷa

These letters are named by adding the words ਪੈਰ ਬਿੰਦੀ (par bindī) to the name of the letter, so ਸ਼ is called ਸੱਸੇ ਪੈਰ ਬਿੰਦੀ (sassē par bindī), which literally means sassaa with a dot in its foot. Many Punjabi speakers do not make a distinction between ਖ ਖ਼ ਗ ਗ਼ and ਫ ਫ਼. There are two main reasons for this, first their pronunciation is quite similar and second, they are used to differentiate borrowed words from other languages, the knowledge of which is decreasing in East Punjab.

Please note, there is no use par bindī in the Guru Granth Sahib Ji.

Subjoined consonants

Some Punjabi words require consonants to be written in a conjunct form, which takes the shape of a subscript to the main letter. The second consonant is written under the first as a subscript. There are only three commonly used subjoined letters and to distinguish them from their normal forms the word ਪੈਰੀਂ (pairīṃ), which means belonging to the foot, is attached under the letter.

Full Letter	Name of Full Letter	Subjoined Letter	Name of subjoined Letter
	hāahāa		ਪੈਰੀਂ ਹਾਹਾ pairīṃ hāahāa
	rāarāa		ਪੈਰੀਂ ਰਾਰਾ pairīṃ rāarāa
	vāavāa		ਪੈਰੀਂ ਵਾਵਾ pairīṃ vāavāa

For the purpose of transliteration there is no special sign for the subjoined character so you will have to pay careful attention to the Punjabi spelling.

Nasalisation

There are five nasal consonants in Gurmukhi:

pha	nja	na	na	ma

As shown above, the nasal consonants belong to the five different classes of consonants. Nasalisation is produced by directing a substantial part of the breath towards the nasal cavity as the sound is being uttered. In addition there are two nasalization signs in Punjabi which accompany consonants:

ਬਿੰਦੀ (bindī)

ਟਿੱਪੀ (ṭippī)

These will be covered below.

Vowels

There are ten vowel phonemes in Punjabi in contrast to the English twenty or so. Punjabi symbols are generally as they are written following the one sign-one sound rule. They are vowels making only one sound. However, there are two forms that vowels can take. The independent vowel form which does not require a consonant and the dependent form which is attached to a consonant. All consonants use the dependent form of the vowel. First table shows the name and sound of the dependent vowels and second table shows their sound combined with the consonant ਸ.

Vowel Sign	Sound		Name Of Vowel
(invisible)		a	ਮੁਕਤਾ	muktā
		āa	ਕੰਨਾ	kannā
		i	ਸਿਹਾਰੀ	sihārī
		ee	ਬਿਹਾਰੀ	bihārī
		u	ਔਂਕੜ	auṅkaṛ
		oo	ਦੁਲੈਂਕੜ	dulaiṅkaṛ
		ē	ਲਾਂਵਾਂ	lāvā
		ai	ਦੁਲਾਂਵਾਂ	dulāvā
		ō	ਹੋੜਾ	hōṛā
		au	ਕਨੌੜਾ	kanauṛā

Consonant and Vowel Sign	Sound		Pronunciation
ਸ		sa	a in about
ਸਾ		saa	a in part
ਸਿ		si	i in it
ਸੀ		see	ee in see
ਸੁ		su	u in put
ਸੂ		soo	oo in food
ਸੇ		se	a in cake
ਸੈ		sai	a in man
ਸੋ		sō	o in show
ਸੌ		sau	o in bought

You may note that the vowels are divided into five pairs. In the first three, the distinction is between a short and long sound, for example between u and oo. In the last two pairs the distinction is between closed and open sounds so e is closed and ai is open sounding.

Independent Vowels

The independent form of vowels can occur in three ways. First, when the vowel comes at the beginning of a word or a syllable, second in those instances where two vowel sounds are required as a consonant cannot support two vowels, and third, in a diphthong - when two vowels are represented in one syllable. In fact one of the features of Punjabi is the presence of many diphthongs, sometimes with three vowel sounds in one word with no consonant, for instance

Independent vowels are represented by dependent vowels carried by the first three letters of the Gurmukhi alphabet.

oorhaa     Ou

airhaa     Aa

eerhee     Ie

Oorhaa and eerhee are never used on their own. These three vowel signs do not represent any consonant sounds. They must be accompanied by their allocated vowel signs. Their main function is to denote their own respective vowel sounds. They are founder, basic or parent vowel bearers representing the ten sounds. However, the pronunciation of both independent and dependent vowels is the same.

Formula
	'u' is added to		to give 'au'
	'oo' is added to		to give 'au'
	'o' is added to consonant letters (when added to consonant sign k - gives 'ko')		to give 'a'
(invisible sign)			'e'
	'aa' is added to		to give 'ew'
	'ai' is added to		to give 'ey'
	'au' is added to		to give 'eo'
	'i' is added to		to give 'ie'
	'ee' is added to		to give 'ei'
	'e' is added to		to give 'ey'

Auxiliary Signs

1. Nasal Signs

a) ਬਿੰਦੀ (bindī)

Bindi serves to add a nasal sound to a particular vowel. Bindi is used with kannā, lāvā, dulāvā, bihārī, hōṛā and kanauṛā and the independent forms of vowels where 'a' is the bearer. Its sound is the same as 'n' in band, grand, slang, grant. For example,

kāaṇ (crow) = ਕਾਂ

gāaṇ (cow) = ਗਾਂ

b) ਟਿੱਪੀ (ṭippī)

It serves to add a nasal sound to a particular vowel. Tippee is used with muktā, sihārī, auṅkaṛ, dulaiṅkar only. It is not used upon 'a' (instead bindī is used with this letter) and last letter of a word. Its sound is same as 'n' in punch, lunch. For example;

amb (mango) = ਅੰਬ

pañchī (bird) = ਪੰਛੀ

jhaṇḍā (flag) = ਝੰਡਾ

2. ਅਧਕ (adhak)

The function of ਅਧਕ (adhak) is to allocate a double sound to the particular letter that it is assigned to. It should be placed above the preceding letter that is to be read twice, however, in practice it is placed between the two letters. Therefore, when the adhak occurs between two letters, it is the second of the two, that is to be repeated. For example, in the Punjabi word for boundary ਹੱਦ (hadd), the adhak affects the letter ਦ (d) changing the sound of the word from had to hadd. In some cases another vowel sound may come in between the two letters, but the adhak still affects the second letter, for example in the word ਬੱਚਿਓ (bacciō), the adhak comes before the sihari vowel but still affects the letter ਚ (c), so it is pronounced chch. The adhak is a very important, though subtle device, as two letters without an adhak give rise to completely different meanings. For example ਕਦ (kad) means 'when', whereas ਕੱਦ (kadd) means 'height'.

Please note, there is no use adhak in the Guru Granth Sahib Ji.

Tones

One of the unique features of Punjabi, in the variety of modern South AsianLanguages, is the presence of pitch contours. These change the meaning of the word depending on the way it sounds. In technical terms these are called ‘tones' and there are three types: low, high and level. The Punjabi tone system is far less complex than Chinese, the best known tone language. The low tone is characterised by lowering the voice below the normal pitch and then rising back in the following syllable. In the high tone the pitch of the voice rises above its normal level falling back at the following symbol. The level tone is carried by the remaining words. Tones are not represented by any letters or symbols in the Gurmukhi script.

The following are good examples of similar words (sounding the same) but with different tones. The sound files are different for each word, see if someone can test you guess which are which (without looking at the screen).

Low tone				Level tone				High tone
ਝਾ		jhā	peep	ਚਾਅ		cāa	desire	ਚਾਹ		cāh	tea
ਘੋੜਾ		ghōṛā	horse	ਕੋੜਾ		kōṛā	whip	ਕੋਹੜਾ		kōhṛā	leper
ਘੜੀ		ghaṛī	watch	ਕੜੀ		kaṛī	link of a chain	ਕੜ੍ਹੀ		kaṛhī	turmeric curry

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