Palimukhi (ਪਾਲਿਮੁਖੀ)

Palimukhi is an adaptation of the Gurmukhi script for writing Pāli devised by Punya Pranava Pasumarty. Among the various writing systems used in India, Gurmukhi is perfectly suited to transcribe Pāli for the following main reasons:

It contains exactly as many letters as Pāli needs, no more and no fewer.
Pāli uses conjunct consonants of primarily 2 kinds, both of which can beexpressed succictly using Gurmukhi in the following ways:
- nasalised consonants expressed using the [ੰ] mark preceding the letter
- doubled consonants expressed using the [ੰ] mark preceding the letter

In all, the Gurmukhi script brings out the intrinsic simplicity of Pāli phonetic swhile expressing Pāli words in the most compact yet simple fashion, at least ascompared to other scripts of India.

The following are the letters of the Palimukhi script. These are identical to those ofGurmukhi for Punjabi except for the last letter ‘ੜ’, which has the [ɽ] sound in Punjabi but isused for the [ɭ] sound in Palimukhi

Palimukhi script

Download an alphabet chart for Palimukhi

Notes

Apart from the letters and vowel marks, there are also a few other marks used in Palimukhi. They are the following:

Niggahita [ੰ]: this is identical to the Punjabi ‘tippi’ mark in formand function except that it can be used at the end of a word as well, unlike in Punjabi. In general, it is used to precede the following letter with the most suitable nasal sound, but at the end of a word, it is pronounced like a final [ŋ] or [m] sound.
Adhak [ੱ]: this is a mark peculiar to the Gurmukhi script whichdoubles the following letter wherever it occurs in text. Most conjunctconsonants in Pāli are formed by doubling a consonant sound, thus theadhak mark proves to be particularly useful to transcribe them succinctly.
Virama [੍]: this is used to remove the inherent [ʌ] vowel in a letter so that the latter can combine directly with the following consonant sound. Since most conjunct consonants used in Pāli can be expressed using the previous two marks, the virama doesn’t find much use except when both of the former two marks aren’t suitable. Using the virama can result in ligatures.

Sample text

ਮਨੋਪੁੱਬੰਗਮਾ ਧੱਮਾ ਮਨੋਸੇੱਠਾ ਮਨੋਮਯਾ।
ਮਨਸਾ ਚੋ ਪਦੁੱਠੇਨ ਭਾਸਲਿਤ ਵਾ ਕਰੋਲਿਤ ਵਾ।
ਤਤੋ ਨਮ੍ ਦੁੱਖੰ ਅਨ੍ਵੇਲਿਤ ਚੱਕੰਵ ਵਹਤੋ ਪਦੰ।।

Transliteration

Manopubbaṅgamā dhammā, manoseṭṭhā manomayā;
Manasā ce paduṭṭhena, bhāsati vā karoti vā;
Tato nam dukkhaṁ anveti, cakkaṁ'va vahato padaṁ.

Translation

Mind precedes all mental states. Mind is their chief; they are all mind-wrought. If with an impure mind a person speaks or acts suffering follows him like the wheel that follows the foot of the ox.
(Translated by Acharya Buddharakkhita)

Download details of the Palimukhi script (PDF)

Information about Pāli

Scripts created by Punya Pranava Pasumarty

Bhāratalipi Unified Indian Script (BLUIS), Charunagari, Deccan Lipi, Devadeshi, Ethiofarsi, Españabugida, Farsi Alefbet, Featural Lojban Abjad, Haruf-e-Tana, Palimukhi, Neobrahmi, SEAscript, West Eurolex

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