Methods in Madness of Bengali Spelling: A Corpus-based ...

SOUTH ASIAN LANGUAGE REVIEW VOL. XV. No. 2. June 2005.

Methods in Madness of Bengali Spelling: A Corpus-based Investigation

Niladri Sekhar Dash

Indian Statistical Institute, Kolkata

Abstract. The phenomenon of spelling variation in Bengali writing has been identified as one of burning issues of a heated debate for a long period of time among the Bengali users. It draws them into a labyrinth of dilemma and doubt about selection of valid forms out of multiple eligible candidates supplied in the language. The problem is further intensified with recent expansion of use of Bengali in electronic media such as in internet, webpages, emails, computer applications, and multimedia applications. This paper attempts to identify the reasons and patterns of spelling variation as observed in the the written Bengali corpus (Dash 2001). The analyses have potential referential and functional relevance not only in descriptive study of modern Bengali but also in the works of applied linguistics and language technology.

1. Introduction

The inherent dynamism of a language leads it to manifest itself in multiple ways. Spelling variation of words is one of them, which, aims at showing how standard orthography is utilised to represent sounds, how letters are arranged to form words, and how characters change to alter spelling. In this paper, we furnish a description and analysis of spelling variation of the Bengali words, which, in return, provides us valuable information about the new directions of change in Bengali spelling system. This empirical study also provides us an opportunity to explore the phenomenon in details to know why, where, and how words vary in their orthographic representation in the language

For many years now, the phenomenon of spelling variation of words has been one of the most crucial issues in Bengali. The language has become famous for having a large number of words, which exhibit multiple spelling variations in synchronic and diachronic dimensions. The analysis of empirical databases shows that substitution of characters is the main factor for spelling variation although deletion of characters is not less responsible for this. Moreover, addition and transposition (i.e. displacement) of characters are equally active in this operation. We have identified that various phonological processes, which are quite active in regular Bengali speech acts, are responsible behind spelling variations of words (Dash 2006: 28).

64 Methods in Madness of Bengali Spelling: A Corpus-based Investigation

2. Earlier Studies on Spelling Variation

While we are investigating the history spelling variation in different languages we find that spelling of English words had remained variable throughout the 16th and the 17th century, which evoked debates among the language users. Scholars like William Bullokar and Richard Mulcaster tried to bring in uniformity in spelling of English words. Since they were not much successful in their efforts, over the centuries, the phenomenon of spelling variation troubled English people to such an extent that by the end of the 18th century any individual variation in spelling was widely denounced as intolerable. This again led scholars like Nathan Bailey to take strong initiatives for regularising as well as standardizing spelling of those words that registered variations. Finally, in the dictionary of Bailey (1730), and more particularly in the dictionary of Johnson (1755) spelling of English words was fixed and standardised (Landau 2001: 99). People coming from all walks of life accepted the new standardised spelling and no variation was entertained for centuries. Thus, spelling of the English words was made uniform and standard with a few exceptions1. The tradition still continues.

Variation of spelling of words noted in American English is not accepted in British English. Moreover, these variations are very less in number and notably are found only in American English. These are, however, accepted as standard spellings in American English and no further variation of the spelling already modified, is not encouraged2.

For the purpose of standardizing spelling of Bengali words scholars like Suniti Kumar Chattopadhyay and Prasantachandra Mahalanabish made sincere efforts in the early part of the 20th century. Their initiatives were acknowledged by Rabindranath Tagore, Haraprasad Shastri and other stalwarts of that time (Mahalanabish 1925). At the same time, the publication unit of Viswabharati developed a spelling manual to publish works of Tagore, the Noble Laureate (Mahalanabish 1925).

After a few years, University of Calcutta, Kolkata under the chairmanship of Rajsekhar Basu, made initiatives to standardise spelling of Bengali words during 1936 and 1937, taking into account views and suggestions of an expert committee formed for the purpose. Some of the observations made in this proposal were, however, different from the proposals furnished in the manual of Viswabharati. Due to several reasons, the proposals of University of Calcutta (1936-37) were not well accepted by native Bengali people (Dash 2006: 32).

More than fifty years passed before Paschimbanga Bangla Akademi took up this issue seriously in the last decade of the 20th century. In the mean time, publishing houses such as Saraswati Press (1956), Pratiksan Publications (1978), Ananda Bazar Patrika (1994), and Sahitya Samsad (1998) made some sporadic individual attempts for introducing uniformed spelling for those words

Niladri Sekhar Dash 65

that registered variations. Interestingly, attempts initiated by these publishing houses differed from each other with regard to deciding the ‘standard form’ of spelling. In fact, the situation still continues with regular addition of new proposals and spellings. Perhaps, it has no easy solution, which the present generation of Bengali users is craving for.

Besides institutional enterprises, individual scholars also took initiatives for standardising spelling of Bengali words. Starting with Rabindranath Tagore (1909), Rajsekhar Basu (1962), Debaprasad Ghosh (1953), Jagannath Chakravarty (1978), Bijan Bihari Bhattacharya (1985), Pabitra Sarkar (1992), Hasan Mamud (1992), Ksudiram Das (1993), Manindra Kumar Ghosh (1994), Subhas Bhattacharya (1994), Mahbubul Hak (1995), Jyoti Bhusan Chaki (1996), Ramen Bhattacharya (1997), Paresh Chandra Majumdar (1998), Mridul Kanti Basu (2002), and others deserve special mention for their insightful observations, scholarly judgements, and logical deductions.

Within last few years, many scholars and various academic institutions of West Bengal and Bangladesh have come forward to bring uniformity in spelling. As a result, some spelling dictionaries are published within a short period of time. Among these, the spelling dictionary of Paschimbanga Bangla Akademi (1997) is an outcome of fruitful debates among the experts3. After its publication, primary and secondary schools of the state are requested to follow the spellings proposed in it. Moreover, those publishing houses, which publish books and study materials used in secondary and higher secondary schools of the state, are also requested to follow spellings proposed in it4. The Samsad Spelling Dictionary (1998), on the other hand, is compiled after summing up various suggestions forwarded by a committee formed for the purpose. Here also, it is informed that the spelling proposed in this dictionary is followed for the preparation of all primers and books published by this organisation5.

At the individual level, the dictionary of Arun Sen (1993) includes only those words, which have spelling disputes while the dictionary of Phanibhusan Acharya (1996) provides only primary information about correct spellings. There have been some efforts also from Bangladesh. The dictionary of Jamil Chaudhuri (1994) includes almost all the words with or without alternative spellings. But, spelling dictionary of Bangla (1999) (edited by Sourabh Sikdar) is a collection of words with correct spellings along with a set of rules for correct and simplified spelling proposed by the Bangla Academy, Bangladesh.

3. Factors behind Spelling Variation

Despite several institutional efforts, organisational initiatives, and individual attempts, any widely acceptable solution for standardisation of Bengali spelling still remains a distant dream. Since variation of spelling is one of the most crucial and prominent features in the texts taken from the Bengali corpus


(Dash 2001), the question that really haunts us in this context is why despite so many attempts made by so many scholars in so many ways the goal still remains elusive for us.

The debate over spelling variation would have been entirely irrelevant if any of the following factors were settled:

Each word would have a single standard spelling, or If there were a clear-cut instruction for words with multiple spellings

about which spelling would be used in which context, or There was no controversy regarding the correctness of spelling in the

language. Unfortunately, none of the factors is true for Bengali. So, spelling differs

from person to person as well as from text to text. Moreover, a careless and casual approach on behalf of the language users seriously hinders them from following the norms prescribed by the experts and authorities. The problem becomes intensified when some first-running publishing houses enthusiastically join in the game and propose different set of spellings that differ from others as well as from the existing so-called ‘standard forms’. In our view a ‘push-others-aside’ game like this, rather than mitigating the crisis, aggravates the situation by adding fuel to the fire.

When we go through the entire corpus database of words reflecting spelling variations, we find some apparent clues, which lead us to identify the following reasons that contribute in direct and indirect ways for variations of spelling in Bengali. (a) The negative role of printing media (i.e. newspapers, posters, magazines,

placards, etc.) in creating variations in spelling is fatal. Regarding the choice of spelling, printing media has a very strong impact on common people. Some publishing houses intentionally try to use different spelling, which influences common people in their use of spelling. In most cases, general impression is that a particular spelling used by a printed house is absolutely right to be used anywhere without hesitation.

(b) The negative impact of electronic media such as televisions and films is equally strong on common users. A particular spelling used in a popular television serial or a film made by renowned directors, usually influences common users to accept that as the correct one and use it in their writings.

(c) Suggestions for correct spelling proposed by the authorities over the years are hardly followed in practice. Also, there had never been any attempt to verify if common people use the proposed spellings. Therefore, the target group had never tried sincerely to follow proposals made by the University of Calcutta. The proposals of Paschimbanga Bangla Akademi, Kolkata met with same fate.

(d) Some noted academicians, writers, columnists, and scholars opposed the suggestions made by others on certain grounds (mostly unknown). Besides,


they themselves used spelling according to their own choice disregarding existing norms and practices. This made situation more aggravated, since their admirers and fans, in an effort to mimic them, have blindly adopted the spelling their idols normally use.

(e) Linguistically, the use of calit (i.e. colloquial) form in place of sādhu (i.e. chaste) form, tendency to bring orthography of words near to speech, and simplification of structurally complex words, etc. often motivated language users to use different spellings.

(f) The present Bengali writing system used in computer and electronic type writing registers several limitations for proper orthographic representation of words, which also instigated the language users to write some words according to their own utterances.

(g) The problem is further intensified when a large number of foreign words are transcripted into Bengali using existing orthography. Particularly, in case of the proper names of persons, places, items, objects, etc. of foreign origin nobody cares about spelling. Print media is mainly responsible for this, since their documents display high irregularity. As a result, foreign words show more spelling variations than native words.

(h) The phonological limitations underlying the existing alphabet system of Bengali may be referred to in this context. Since, it does not have any specific orthographic symbol that can properly represent a particular sound of foreign origin (as it does not have a letter to represent /æ/ sound), words like acid is transcripted as ayāsiD, eyāsiD, eyāsiD, and yyāsiD in Bengali. Similarly, the word actor is written as ayākţar, ekţar, eyākţar and yyākţar. The role of printing media is responsible for variations in this case too.

Based on the above, we constructed Figure 1 which shows the pattern of

change in Bengali spelling caused due to various linguistic as well as non-linguistic factors recurrent in the language6.

Utterance

Foreign style Print media

↓

Particular spelling

→

Various Influences

→

Change in spelling

↑ Personal choice

Linguistic factors Nonlinguistic factors

Fig.1 Patterns of spelling variation in Bengali words


It is quite natural that a living natural language, because of its dynamic nature and diverse application, may possess some words that show different spellings. Though it is a permissible gradience in most of the natural languages, it is expected that it should be small in number and within the grasp of language users so that they face hardly any problem to deal with them. But for Bengali, however, the scenario is not so encouraging. Here the number of words with spelling variation is really very large to surpass all levels of our expectation.

4. Nature of Spelling Variation

We argue that the basic reasons behind the phenomenon of spelling variation in Bengali lie within its writing system, which, like most natural languages, does not have well devised convention for representing all the features of speech in writing (Atkins, Clear, and Ostler 1992). The phenomenon becomes far more colourful due to direct impact of utterance on writing.

The examples collected from the Bengali text corpus shows that the basic motivation behind change of spelling is led by an urge for representing spelling as a true replica of utterance. Due to this, various phonological processes such as vowel harmony, segment assimilation, nasalization, denasalization, euphonic combination, gemination, deaspiration, syllable loss, etc. become instrumental for bringing in spelling change in surface form of words. Taking these factors into consideration, one can find the followings as the salient features of spelling variation in Bengali: (a) Alternation of spelling occurs at all positions (i.e. initial, intermediate, and

final) of words. Simple orthographic alternation is incorporated by various processes triggered by different phonological changes.

(b) Factors like pronunciation, usage, motivation for spelling simplification, etc. take active part for variation of spelling. In most cases, pronounciation of words determines spelling, although regular usage and motivation for simplification are also quite active.

(c) Variation of spelling does not occur for all words used in the corpus. There are about five thousand words that exhibit spelling variation (Dash 2006: 55). As shown in Table 1, nearly 80% words have only two variants while the remaining 20% words have three, four, or more variants.

Table 1 Number of spelling variation in the Bengali corpus

Words with spelling variation Percentage Words with two spellings 80 % Words with three spellings 7 % Words with four spellings 7 % Words with more than 4 spellings 6 %


(d) The maximum use of a particular spelling in contrast to all other variants included in the text indicates its acceptance among most of the people. For instance, the spelling of hala ‘happened’ registers nearly 70% occurrence in the corpus in contrast to other alternative forms such as halo, hola, holo, h’ala, etc. In such a case, we argue to accept hala as a standard one, since it registers highest frequency of use in all text types. Statistical inference helps us to accept a particular spelling in the language.

(e) Variation of spelling mostly ranges within two, as in, nic : nīc ‘low’, bāŗi : bāŗī ‘house’, bhāla : bhālo ‘good’, mata : mato ‘like’, garu : goru ‘cow’, hirā : hīrā ‘diamond’, etc. However, for some words it ranges from four to fourteen7 (some examples are listed in Table 2)

Table 2 Sample of words with multiple spellings

No Examples taken from the corpus Glossary 4 rāni, rānī, rāņi, rāņī queen 6 cāprāś, cāprāsi, cāprāsī, cāprāś, cāprāśi, cāprāśī servant 8 beŉāci, beŉgāci, byāŉāci, byāŉgāci, beŉāchi,

beŉgāchi, byāŉāchi, byāŉgāchi tad pole

8 ghumana, ghumano, ghumāna, ghumāno, ghumona, ghumono, ghumuna, ghumuno

sleeping

12 beyādapi, beyādapī, beyādabi, beyādabī, be-ādapi, be-ādapī, be-ādabi, be-ādabī, beādapi, beādapī, bādabi, beādabī

obstinacy

14 kŗścān, kŗscān, kŗsţān, kŗşţān, kriścān, kriscān, krisţān, krişţān, khŗsţān, khŗşţān, khrisţān, khrīsţān, khrişţān, khrīşţān

Christian

(f) Tatsama words are more or less uniform in spelling as they follow strict

spelling rules prescribed in Sanskrit. Both tadbhava and deśi (i.e. native) words are moderate and manageable. In case of bideśi (i.e. foreign) words the number of variation is enromous. Among foreign words, proper names varied the most. For instance, Australia is written as asţreliyā, asţrāliyā, aşţreliyā, and aşţrāliyā; England is written as iŉlyānD, iŉlyāņD, iŉlanD, and iŉlaņD; German is written as jārmān, jarmāni, and jarmānī; Italy is spelt as iţli, iţāli, iţālī, itāli and itālī; and America is written as ayāmerikā, āmerikā, āmrikā, and yāmerikā; etc.8.

5. Types of Spelling Variation

The motivation behind this the discussion is not to prescribe about what should be the right spelling of words. Rather, we present a systematic description of the patterns of variations as we observe them in the corpus. We expect that


people entrusted with the task for proposing right spelling will find relevant information from this description to formulate their arguments. This discussion is, therefore, an empirical contribution towards the formation of some judicious propositions.

The analysis of examples shows that variation of spelling may be classified into four broad types according to the degree of frequency of occurrence in the corpus: (a) deletion of character, (b) replacement of character, (c) addition of character, and (d) transposition of character. Each type is described below with examples collected from the corpus.

5.1 Deletion of Character in Words

Deletion of character from a word includes deletion of a vowel, consonant, vowel allograph, consonant graphic variant, cluster, or diacritic symbol. It may occur at any position of a word without affecting its meaning, although, to certain extent, pronunciation is affected. Technically, the deletion of a character (C) 9 may be explained in these manners: (a) C1C2C3 > ØC2C3 (C1 > Ø), (b) C1C2C3 > C1ØC3 (C2 > Ø), and (c) C1C2C3 > C1C2Ø (C3 > Ø). In the following sections, different types of character deletion, as found with the words collected from the corpus, are discussed with reference to some examples.

5.1.1 Deletion of a Vowel Grapheme Deletion of a vowel grapheme occurs at word-medial position only. Among these, i, u, and o are deleted either because of the conversion of sādhu words into calit form or because of the loss of a syllable within a word. E.g. āţhāiś: āţhāś ‘twenty-eight’, sātāiś: sātāś ‘twenty-seven’, gnāiti: gnāti ‘spade’, cāul: cāl ‘rice’, etc. The vowel graphemes i and u are lost due to the presence of ā in immediately preceding syllable. Occurrence of two consecutive vowels within a word causes loss of the second one, since preceding vowel carries entire load of syllabic stress that eventually rings a death-bell for the following vowel grapheme. The mode of deletion is defined as: C1V1V2C2 > C1V1VøC2 > C1V1C2 where V2 is lost due to syllabic stress on V1.

5.1.2 Deletion of a Vowel Allograph Deletion of a vowel allograph occurs at all positions of a word. Generally, allographs of ā, i, e, o, and u are deleted from words, most of which occur due to loss of word-middle or word-final syllable at the time of utterance. (a) Allograph of ā is deleted at word-initial syllable. E.g. kālej: kalej ‘college’,

tāmām: tamām ‘whole’, tāmādi: tamādi ‘obsolete’, pāñjāb: pañjāb ‘Punjab’, pāydal: paydal ‘on foot’, phāţkā: phaţkā ‘gambling’, bāmāl: bamāl ‘luggage’, etc. The loss of allograph of the word-initial consonant generates a kind of phonological cluster with its immediately succeeding


consonant grapheme. Since such a cluster is not permitted in Bengali, the word-initial consonant is uttered with an inherent /O/ sound, which is acceptable, since Bengali consonant graphemes and clusters mostly belong to this type. Examples show two stages of change: loss of an allograph (orthographically) and re-emergence of consonant with inherent /O/ sound (phonetically).

(b) An allograph is also deleted at word-intermediate position. E.g. kabālā : kablā ‘will’, jānālā : jānlā ‘window’, bichānā : bichnā ‘bed’, ekelā : eklā ‘alone’, gāmochā : gāmchā ‘towel’, ādhuli : ādhli ‘half-rupee’, piţuni : piţni ‘cudgel’, kāţuni : kāţni ‘cutter’, kābuli : kābli ‘made in Kabul’, kuţhuri : kuţhri ‘chamber’, cāluni : cālni ‘sieve’, bijuli : bijli ‘lightning’, etc. Word-intermediate allograph is deleted due to the loss of word-medial syllable, as a result of which, a trisyllabic word changes into disyllabic form. The loss may be shown in the following way: C1V1C2V2C3V3 > C1V1C2VøC3V3 > C1V1C2C3V3 (V2 > Ø). Interestingly, the loss of word-medial allograph causes formation of phonetic cluster between C2 and C3, which occur immediately before and after the lost allograph although the consonants did not merge orthographically to generate orthographic cluster (Sarkar 1993).

(c) An allograph is also deleted at word-final positions due to stress given on penultimate syllable. E.g. kinārā : kinār ‘border’, basati : basat ‘locality’, rāti : rāt ‘night’, lāthi : lāth ‘kick’, jāti : jāt ‘caste’, nāti : nāt ‘grandson’, etc. Deletion of allograph in words is represented as: C1V1C2V2 > C1V1C2

(V2 > Ø) and C1V1C2V2C3V3 > C1V1C2V2C3 (V3 > Ø). Because of such deletion, a large number of trisyllabic and disyllabic words are changed into disyllabic and monosyllabic forms in Bengali.

5.1.3 Deletion of a Consonant Grapheme Deletion of a consonant grapheme generally takes place at the word-middle and final positions. It is caused due to the loss of a syllable in a word when a polysyllabic word changes into a disyllabic form and when a disyllabic word changes into a monosyllabic form. Orthographically, although it appears to be the deletion of a consonant grapheme, from phonological point of view, it is a syllable loss, as the following examples show. (a) Some consonant graphemes are often deleted at word-final position. E.g.,

ābeśan : ābeś ‘spell’, ālāpan : ālāp ‘conversation’, kampan : kampa ‘vibration’, jamin : jami ‘earth’, āllāha : āllā ‘god’, bādśāha : bādśā ‘king’, māldaha : mālda ‘Maldaha’, śiāldaha : śiālda ‘Sealdah’, mihin : mihi ‘fine’, etc. The process of loss may be defined as C1V1C2V2C3 > C1V1C2V2 (C3 > Ø).

(b) Some consonant graphemes are deleted at word-medial position. E.g. bahi : bai ‘book’, bahuni : bauni ‘first sale’, bāhire : bāire ‘outside’, māhinā :


māinā ‘salary’, sahi : sai ‘signature’, sahis : sais ‘coachman’, gābhi : gāi ‘cow’, nābhi : nāi ‘naval’, śāśuŗi : śāśuŗi ‘mother-in-law’, sakhi : sai ‘female friend’, nahi : mai ‘ladder’, ruhi : rui ‘plant’, nadī : nai ‘river’, kahi : kai ‘say’, kabutar : kautar ‘dove’, etc. This process of deletion may be defined as C1V1C2V2 > C1V1V2 (C2 > Ø). The reason behind the deletion of the word-medial consonant grapheme perhaps lies in its occurrence in between two vowels. Because of the deletion, the following vowel occupies the vacant place to form a diphthong with the preceding vowel present before deleted consonant.

(c) A word-medial consonant grapheme tagged with inherent vowel, is sometimes deleted in words. E.g. majdur : majur ‘labour’, tahasil : tasil ‘tehsil’, ţhākurmā : ţhākumā ‘grandmother’, tahabil : tabil ‘fund’, pāyjāmā : pājāmā ‘pyjama’, phālgun : phāgun ‘spring’, nāmbār : nāmār ‘to get alight’, thāmbār : thāmār ‘to stop’ etc. This kind of loss is identified as syllabic syncope or haplology, which is represented as C1V1C2V2C3V3 > C1V1C3V3 (C2V2 > Ø). In other way, word-medial consonant grapheme is lost due to respective conversion of trimoric and bimoric words into bimoric and isomoric ones.

5.1.4 Deletion of a Diacritic Symbol Deletion of a diacritic symbol includes the loss of candrabindu (i.e. moon-dot), yaphalā (i.e. diacritic of y), and visarga (i.e. diacritic of h) from words as the following examples show. (a) Candrabindu is deleted at word-initial position. E.g. incaR : icaR ‘green

jackfruit’, inţ : iţ ‘brick’, knāc : kāc ‘glass’, cnāţi : cāţi ‘slap’, Dhnekur : Dhekur ‘belch’, pnui : pui ‘pot-herb’, jhnāţā : jhāţā ‘broom’, bneji : beji ‘mongoose’, etc. After seeing large numbers of instance of this kind in the corpus we wonder if candrabindu has any phonemic value in Bengali. It appears that Bengali people are not aware if it has any phonemic role to play in writing. To them, it is simply a decorative symbol - the presence or absence of which does not hamper form and meaning of words. But this is not true. In actuality, addition or deletion of a candrabindu affects meaning of words, because it has distinct phonemic value in Bengali. E.g. kācā ‘washed’ and knācā ‘raw’, kāţā ‘cut’ and knāţā ‘thorn’, gā ‘body’ and gnā ‘village’, kuŗi ‘twenty’ and knuŗi ‘bud’, chād ‘roof’ and chnād ‘design’, bādhā ‘obstacle’ and bnādhā ‘knit’, jāti ‘caste’ and jnāti ‘nut-cracker’, badhu ‘bride’ and bnadhu ‘friend’, etc. So, loss of candrabindu in Bengali words should be considered not as a special type of spelling change, but as an instance of carelessness on the part of the users.

(b) The yaphalā is mostly deleted at word-final position. E.g. kāryya : kārya ‘work’, sūryya : sūrya ‘sun’, āścayya : āścarya ‘surprise’, āhāryya : āhārya ‘food’, gharmya : gharma ‘sweat’, harmya : harma ‘palace’, etc.


The change is as a result of the proposal of the University of Calcutta made in 1936-1937. Statistical count shows that in many cases, users did not follow the proposal, as a result of which, number of words with yaphalā is more than the number of words without it. Further analysis shows that while texts from mass media, school curriculum, and imaginative prose (i.e. fictions, stories, etc.) have words without yaphalā, texts from law, religion, philosophy, culture, medicine, tradition, music, art and others have retained this diacritic symbol. The notable thing is that except in a few cases (e.g. arghya ‘offering’ : argha ‘value’, dantya ‘dental’ : danta ‘teeth’, lakşya ‘notable’ : lakşa ‘lacs’, etc.), the deletion of this diacritic symbol does not hamper the meaning of the words.

(c) Finally, the diacritic symbol visarga (h:) is deleted at the word-middle and word-final position. E.g. atah:par : atapar ‘after this’, antah: : anta ‘end’, phalatah: : phalata ‘as a result’, ojah: : oja ‘vigour’, baśatah: : baśata ‘for reason’, mūlatah: : mūlata ‘basically’, bāh: : bā ‘very well’, etc. This is also caused due to the proposal of University of Calcutta made in 1936-1937. However, in the text corpus, number of words without the visarga symbol far exceeds the number of words decorated with this symbol.

The examples given above show that, in most cases, deletion of these diacritic symbols does not change meaning of words in a great extent. Probably, due to this reason, users do not pay much attention to the presence or absence of these symbols in their writings.

5.1.5 Deletion of Syllable made with Two Characters Another interesting type of spelling variation in Bengali text is noted in case of deletion of a group of consonants constituting a syllable. The uniqueness of this type of loss lies in two factors. First, loss of the syllable in utterance is truly reflected on the spelling of words. This is caused due to some phonological processes, which actively operate in utterance of words. Second, the loss of syllable is manifested not only in the deletion of an allograph but also in the loss of the consonants to which the allograph was tagged. (a) A group of characters constituting a syllable is deleted at word-medial

position. E.g., agrahāyaņ : aghrāņ ‘a Bengali month’, kayetbel : kaťbel ‘shelled fruit’, khariddār : khadder ‘customer’, giyechen : gechen ‘has gone’, pharmāyeś : pharmāś ‘order’, phalāhār : phalār ‘fruit-diet’, etc.

(b) A group of characters constituting a syllable is deleted at the word-final position. E.g., aŉgurīya : aŉgurī ‘finger-ring’, abicalita : abical ‘undisturbed’, abhāginī : abhāgī ‘unfortunate girl’, ābchāyā : ābchā ‘shadowy’, narendra : naren ‘best among men’, makşikā : makşī ‘fly’, yuthikā : yuthi ‘jasmine’, etc.

Deletion of syllable changes utterance of some polysyllabic and disyllabic words into disyllabic and monosyllabic words, respectively. Although the


number of words that undergo such change is not large in number in the language, the phenomenon, due to its unique nature easily arrests our attention.

5.1.6 Deletion of Substring of Characters Sometimes a substring of characters representing a syllable is lost in words. It is a different kind of deletion as the characters, which are deleted, does not take place side-by-side in words. Rather, they occur across the words. When these are pronounced either as the last part of W1 or the first part of W2, they are lost due to euphonic combination. As a result, two separate words are merged together to form single words, e.g., ek ek > ekek ‘certain’, eta din > eddin ‘so many days’, tata din > taddin ‘those days’, diye āy > diyāy ‘return after giving’, ber habe > berobe ‘will appear’, baŗa didi > baŗdi ‘elder sister’, baŗa dādā > baŗdā ‘elder brother’, choţa kākā > choţkā ‘younger uncle’, kothā theke > kottheke ‘where from’, yā icche tāi > yācchetāi ‘as one wills’, yata dūr > yaddur ‘as far as’, kata dūr > kaddur ‘how far’, bhāla lāge > bhāllāge ‘will like’, nā haile > nahile ‘if not’, etc. We agree with scholars (Majumadar 1978: 35-37, Sarkar and Basu 1994: 63-64) who identify these as examples of pure Bengali sandhi.

5.2 Replacement of Character in Words

Replacement of a character by another character having similar or near similar phonetic representation is a common type of spelling variation in Bengali. In most cases, a vowel grapheme is replaced by its allograph having similar sound (e.g. ā-allograph in place of ā) or an allograph is replaced by another allograph having similar sound (e.g. i for ī, u for ū). Similarly, a consonant grapheme is replaced by another phonetically similar consonant grapheme (e.g. s for ś and ş, and n for ņ). The process of replacement may be defined as C1C2C3 > C4C2C3 when C1 = C4 in utterance (C stands for a character).

Replacement of character occurs at all positions of words: initial, medial and final. Since replacement generally takes place between those characters, which are similar in sound, it does not generally affect the overall utterance of words. However, at certain contexts, utterance is partially affected due to assimilation, vowel harmony, deaspiration, devoicing or similar such phonological processes quite active in Bengali speech. In the following subsections all major types of character replacement are discussed with examples obtained from the Bengali corpus.


5.2.1 A Vowel Grapheme by Other Vowel Grapheme Replacement of a vowel grapheme by another vowel grapheme generally takes place at initial position of a word. This kind of replacement is basically of two types. (a) Replacement takes place between those vowel graphemes, which are near

similar in sound (e.g. ī : i, ū : u etc.). E.g. īthār : ithār ‘ether’, īgal : igal ‘eagle’, īd : id ‘Id’, beduīn : beduin ‘nomad’, beīmān : beimān ‘shameless’, ūrdu : urdu ‘Urdu’, ūniś : uniś ‘nineteen’, etc. In both cases, the process of replacement restores the standard utterance and meaning of the words.

(b) Replacement takes place between those vowel graphemes, which are not identical in utterance but almost nearer to each other (e.g. a : e, ā : a, a : o, i : e, u : o, o : u). E.g. aman : eman ‘such’, ata : eta ‘so much’, alimpik : olimpik ‘Olympic’, akt : okt ‘time’, amiya : omiya ‘nectar’, āorat : aorat ‘women’, ākāţ : akāţ ‘blunt’, ākām : akām ‘bad work’, āpis : apis ‘office’, āsām : asam ‘Assam’, incaŗ : encaŗ ‘green jackfruit’, ināmel : enāmel ‘enamel’, ilāhi : elāhi ‘god’, uţhā : oţhā ‘rise’, uŗā : oŗā ‘fly’, uŗiyā : oŗiyā ‘Oriya’, ulţāno : olţāno ‘tumble’, phāo : phāu ‘extra’, etc. Replacement of one vowel grapheme by another one makes notable change in utterance of words. In most cases, such a change is caused due to vowel harmony — a highly active phonological process in normal Bengali speech acts.

5.2.2 A Vowel Grapheme by a Vowel Allograph Replacement of a vowel grapheme by a vowel allograph is a common practice in spelling variation in Bengali. It takes place both at word-medial and final position. It happens generally for vowel grapheme i and o, as shown below: (a) The vowel graphemes i or o, when used as emphatic particles at the end of

words, normally change into an allograph to be tagged with a word-final, non-allographed consonant grapheme, because the consonant grapheme, due to utterance, loses inherent vowel sound (as shown within parenthesis). E.g. eman(å)i : emani ‘such’, sakal(å)i : sakali ‘all’, kebal(å)i : kebali ‘only’, yeman(å)i : yemani ‘such’, teman(a)i : temani ‘such’, ār(å)o : āro ‘more’, eman(å)o : emano ‘such’, kakhan(å)o : kakhano ‘(n)ever’, takhan(å)o : takhano ‘then’, yakhan(å)o : yakhano ‘when’, etc. The loss of the vowel (given in parenthesis) in utterance causes a syllable loss filled in by succeeding emphatic particle. There are five stages of morphophonemic change to explain this process: i. Loss of an inherent vowel sound from word-final, non-allographed

consonant grapheme (phonetic change). ii. Loss of inherent vowel sound of the consonant results in the loss of a

word-final syllable (phonetic change). iii. Loss of syllable is compensated by addition of following emphatic

particle (phonetic change).


iv. The emphatic particle changes into a vowel allograph (orthographic change).

v. The allograph is finally tagged with the word-final, non-allographed consonant grapheme (orthographic change).

(b) A different kind of replacement is seen in the following examples where a word-middle, non-allographed consonant grapheme drops its inherent vowel sound /O/ due to the presence of another vowel grapheme /o/, at its immediately following position. As a result, the following vowel grapheme changes into its own allograph and joins with its immediately preceding non-allographed consonant grapheme. E.g. par(å)oyānā : paroyānā ‘summon’, j(å)oyān : joyān ‘young’, śer(å)oyāni : śeroyāni ‘a kind of Punjabi dress’, pāl(å)oyān : pāloyān ‘wrestler’, etc. Such morphophonemic alternation occurs in case of some Persian and Arabic words inherited into Bengali. In most cases, trimoric words change into bimoric ones due to the loss of word-medial vowel grapheme.

5.2.3 A Diphthong by a Digraph Replacement of a diphthong by a digraph (i.e. an allograph of a diphthong) is a regular process in spelling variation of words in Bengali. The process, however, usually takes place at word-medial and final position as the following examples show. (a) The vowel grapheme i is replaced by digraph of ai in some words. E.g.

ath(å)i : athai ‘fathomless’, k(å)i : kai ‘where’, kh(å)I : khai ‘perched rice’, ch(å)i : chai ‘roof of boat’, d(å)i : dai ‘curd’, p(å)iţhā : paiţhā ‘step’, b(å)i : bai ‘without’, b(å)iţhā : baiţhā ‘scull of boat’, r(å)ir(å)i : rairai ‘hue and cry’, h(å)ic(å)i : haicai ‘noise’, h(å)ih(å)i : haihai ‘din and bustle’, n(å)ile : naile ‘if not’, etc. We guess forms like m(å)i ‘ladder’, h(å)i ‘I am’, etc. will change into mai, hai respectively, following this trend.

(b) The vowel grapheme u is replaced by digraph of au in some other words. E.g. p(å)uş : pauş ‘a Bengali month’, ph(å)uj : phauj ‘army’, b(å)u : bau ‘wife’, b(å)umā : baumā ‘daughter-in-law’, m(å)u : mau ‘honey’, m(å)ul : maul ‘flower of mahua’, m(å)ucāk : maucāk ‘beehive’, m(å)umāchi : maumāchi ‘bee’, m(å)autāt : mautāt ‘stupor’, m(å)uralā : maumralā ‘a kind of tiny fish’, etc. Possibly, in future, a form like h(å)uk ‘let it be’ will change into hauk following this process.

Both phonological and orthographic change in words may be explained in the following way. In both cases, two consecutive vowel graphemes occur of which the first one is a low back vowel /O/ and the second one is either a high front vowel /i/ (as in (a)] or a high back vowel /u/ [as in (b)). Their consecutive occurrence generates sounds like /oi/ and /ou/, which are almost similar to diphthongs available in Bengali. Therefore, replacement of two consecutive


vowels by a diphthong has been an easy and natural process, which eventually manifests in regular replacement of vowel graphemes by digraphs. In both cases, however, standard utterance and meaning of words are not at all affected.

5.2.4 Vowel Grapheme by a Combination of Two Characters Sometimes, for variation of spelling, a vowel grapheme is replaced by its own allograph preceded by semivowel y. This happens mostly for the vowel grapheme ā when it is used in some Persian and Arabic words inherited into Bengali. E.g. beāŗā : beyāŗā (be-āŗā) ‘odd’, doāb : doyāb (do-āb) ‘basin’, beākkel : beyākkel (be-ākkel) ‘foolish’, beādap : beyādap (be-ādap) ‘impudent’, beāinī : be-yāinī (be- āinī) ‘illegal’, beābru : beyābru (be-ābru) ‘coverless’, etc.

A fine scheme of morphophonemic change works behind such variation. It is noted that these are mostly compound words where a prefix (be- or do-) is added with a stem starting with the vowel grapheme ā to generate final form. As a occurrence of two consecutive vowel graphemes within a word is usually not permitted, semivowel y is inserted in between the two vowel graphemes. Furthermore, since the vowel ā cannot occur in its original form at word-middle position, it changes into its own allographic form to tag with y to generate yā. Such a smooth orthographic operation was possible because both the early and the new forms have identical utterance patterns. This kind of change, however, is avoidable if a hyphen is inserted between the prefix-ending and stem-initiating vowel graphemes as shown with examples put in the first bracket.

5.2.5 An Allograph by another Allograph Replacement of an allograph by another allograph is perhaps the most common type of spelling variation of words in Bengali. Since the number of such words in the corpus is very large, only some examples are cited here. The process of change may be classified in two types: (a) replacement takes place between those allographs that are identical in utterance (e.g. ī : i and ū : u), and (b) replacement takes place between those allographs that are not identical but near to articulation. The first type is further divided into two kinds as defined in the following examples:

i. Allograph of the short vowel grapheme i replaces allograph of the long vowel ī in some words. E.g. kī : ki ‘what’, cīn : cin ‘China’, cīţkār : ciţkār ‘loud noise’, nīc : nic ‘below’, bhīru : bhiru ‘coward’, hīrā : hirā ‘diamond’, āpīl : āpil ‘appeal’, ābīr : ābir ‘coloured powder’, āmīr : āmir ‘rich’, ilīś : iliś ‘hilsa fish’, nasīb : nasib ‘fate’, panīr : panir ‘cheese’, mārīc : māric ‘a demon’, śarīk : śarik ‘partner’, aţabī : aţabi ‘forest’, araņī: araņi ‘flint’, kacurī : kacuri ‘kind of food’, khuśī : khuśi ‘pleasure’, ghānī : ghāni ‘oil-mill’, tarī :


tari ‘boat’, tallāsī : tallāsi ‘search’, nakśī : nakśi ‘embroidered’, pālkī : pālki ‘palanquin’, bāŗī : bāŗi ‘house’, saraņī : saraņi ‘street’, holī : holi ‘colour festival’, etc.

ii. Allograph of the short vowel grapheme u replaces allograph of the long vowel grapheme ū in words. E.g. kuhū : kuhu ‘song of cuckoo’, tanū : tanu ‘body’, nūpur : nupur ‘anklet-bells’, pūjā : pujā ‘worship’, pūbālī : pubālī ‘eastern air’, mūrkha : murkha ‘idiot’, śālūk : śāluk ‘water lily’, hanū : hanu ‘chin’, etc.

In case of the second type, replacement takes place between those allographs, which are not identical in sound but are very near to each other in utterance. This kind of change is recurrent at word-initial, medial and final positions. In most cases, vowel harmony, which is a regular phenomenon in normal Bengali speech, causes such changes. Although utterance of words is largely affected, meaning remains mostly unaffected. At word-initial position, allographs are changed in the following ways:

i. Allograph of vowel grapheme e replaces allograph of the vowel grapheme ā due to vowel harmony. The word-initial central low vowel /a/ is changed into a front mid-high vowel /e/ because of the presence of a front high vowel /i/ in the following syllable. E.g. nāi: nei ‘is not’, hākim: hekim ‘quack’, etc.

ii. Allograph of vowel grapheme e replaces allograph of ā due to vowel dissimilation. Here, a word-initial central low vowel /a/ is changed into a front mid-low /æ/ or front mid-high /e/ vowel because of the presence of another central low vowel /a/ in the following syllable10. E.g. kārdāni: kerdāni ‘bravado’, gnājlā: gnejlā ‘scum’, cāţāi: ceţāi ‘mat’, jānānā: jenānā ‘women’, sālām: selām ‘honour’, etc.11.

iii. Allograph of vowel grapheme e replaces the allograph of the vowel grapheme i in some words. It is also a systematic change, which can be defined by simple vowel alternation. Here, a front high vowel /i/ changes into a front mid-high vowel /e/ due to presence of a central low vowel /a/ in following syllable. E.g. kinā : kenā ‘bought’, gilā : gelā ‘gulped’, cirā : cerā ‘torn’, jitā : jetā ‘won’, jilā : jelā ‘district’, pital : petal ‘bronze’, piyārā : peyārā ‘guava’, phirā : pherā ‘returned’, phirat : pherat ‘returned’, bhijā : bhejā ‘wet’, miţhāi : meţhāi ‘sweets’, miśā : meśā ‘mixed’, milā : melā ‘joined’ śiyāl : śeyāl ‘jackal’, etc.

iv. Allograph of the vowel grapheme o replaces the allograph of vowel grapheme u in some other words. This may be defined as partial vowel alternation where a back high vowel /u/ is changed into a back mid-high vowel /o/ because of the presence of a central low vowel /a/ in following syllable. E.g. khulā : kholā ‘open’, guņā : goņā ‘counted’, juŗā : joŗā ‘connected’, tulā : tolā ‘lifted’, dhuyā : dhoyā


‘washed’, bhulā : bholā ‘forgot’, bunā : bonā ‘weaved’, muchā : mochā ‘rubbed’, phulā : pholā ‘sullen’, etc.

At word-middle position, the allograph of vowel ā is replaced by that of i, u, e, and o, etc. which is described below with examples. The most interesting aspect of this change is that only allograph of vowel ā (not allograph of other vowels) is changed at word-medial position. Why the allographs of other vowels did not undergo this kind of change is still an open and unanswered question. (a) Allograph of vowel ā changes into allograph of vowel i. We find here a

complete vowel harmony where a word-medial central low vowel /a/ changes into a front high vowel /i/ due to its presence within two syllables with front high vowels /i/. E.g. jilāpi : jilipi ‘a kind of sweet meat’, pirāli : pirili ‘a caste of Brahmin’, bilāti : biliti ‘foreign’, bhikhāri : bhikhiri ‘beggar’, etc.

(b) Allograph of vowel ā changes into allograph of vowel u. Here also we observe a vowel harmony where a word-medial central low vowel /a/ changes into a back high vowel /u/ due to its occurrence within an environment of a back high vowel /u/ (i.e. first syllable) and a front high vowel /i/ (i.e. last syllable). E.g. uRŗāni : uŗuni ‘scarf’, kuŗāni : kuŗuni ‘collector’, phuţāni : phuţuni ‘vanity’, supāri : supuri ‘betel nut’, etc.

(c) Allograph of vowel ā changes into allograph of vowel u. The process, however, differs from the process mentioned in (a) and (b). Here a different type of vowel harmony works where a word-medial central low vowel /a/ changes into a back high vowel /u/ falling within an environment of two syllables containing front high vowels /i/. E.g. jhimāni : jhimuni ‘dozing’, piţāli : piţuli ‘liquid rice paste’, simāi : simui ‘a kind of sweet meat’, etc.

Examples provided in (a), (b), and (c) show that in Bengali, vowel harmony takes place both in qualitative and quantitative dimensions. In most cases, central low vowels are changed into high vowels where the front or back quality of the changed vowels are determined by front or back quality of the vowels occurring in first syllable. In (a), a low central vowel is changed into a high front vowel because first syllable carries a high front vowel. In (b), a low central vowel is changed into a high back vowel because first syllable contains a high back vowel. But in (c), the rule does not apply. It is still unknown how a low central vowel becomes a high back vowel without having any high back vowel in its immediate environment.

Examples given in (d), (e), and (f) are instances for explaining the process of partial vowel harmony in Bengali. They also explain how the front and back quality of a changed vowel is determined by front or back quality of the vowel occurring in first syllable.


(d) Word-medial central low vowel /a/ changes either into a front mid-high vowel /e/ or a back mid-high vowel /o/ depending on the presence of a front high vowel /i/ or a back high vowel /u/ in first syllable. E.g. jilāpi: jilepi ‘a kind of sweet meat’, Dhilāmi : Dhilemi ‘callousness’, nikāśi: nikeśi ‘clearing’, nilāmi : nilemi ‘auctioned’, miśāli : miśeli ‘mixed’, hisābi: hisebi ‘calculate’, supāri : supori ‘betel nut’, juyāŗi : juyoŗi ‘gambler’, etc.

(e) Word-final central low vowel /a/ changes into a front mid-high vowel /e/ due to presence of a front high vowel /i/ in preceding syllable. E.g. ijār : ijer ‘short trouser’, citān : citen ‘expanded’, nikāś : nikeś ‘finished’, phicāl : phicel ‘sly’, bikāl : bikel ‘afternoon’, bilāt : bilet ‘foreign’, bidāy : bidey ‘farewell’, hisāb : hiseb ‘account’, bhiyān : bhiyen ‘confectionery’, pinās : pines ‘jack-fruit’, etc.

(f) Word-final central low vowel /a/ changes into a back mid-high vowel /o/ due to presence of a back high vowel /u/ in preceding syllable. E.g. uŗān : uŗon ‘fly’, uţhān : uţhon ‘courtyard’, udām : udom ‘naked’, kumār : kumor ‘potter’, gudām : gudom ‘godown’, cunāţ : cunoţ ‘wrinkle’, chutār : chutor ‘carpenter’, tukhāŗ : tukhoŗ ‘expert’, duyār : duyor ‘gate’, śuyār : śuyor ‘swine’, etc.

We treat changes noted in (d), (e) and (f) as examples of partial vowel harmony because changed vowels did not achieve same level of highness where affecting vowels (i.e. of first syllables) belong. However, in all three cases we discern considerable lift of affected vowels (/a/ changes into /e/ and /o/). Why it fails to become /i/ or /u/ despite their presence in preceding syllables is still a puzzle.

At word-final position, there are three types of orthographic change, which make lasting impact on variation of spelling of words. Since the number of such examples is very high in corpus, only few examples are referred to here to show the patterns of change. Orthographically, allograph of vowel ā is replaced by that of e and o; allograph of i is replaced by that of ā and o; and allograph of o is replaced by that of u, as the following examples show. (a) Variation of spelling is caused due to vowel rising where a low central

vowel /a/ at word-final syllable is raised due to presence of a high front vowel /i/ in preceding syllable. E.g. icchā : icche ‘wish’, kirā : kire ‘swear’, kşīrā : kşīre ‘cucumber’, girā : gire ‘knot’, citā : cite ‘pyre’, ciŗā : ciŗe ‘flattened rice’, chiţā : chiţe ‘pinch’, cimţā : cimţe ‘pincer’, jirā : jire ‘cumin’, jhingā : jhinge ‘kitchen vegetable’, ţikā : ţike ‘vaccination’, ţiyā : ţiye ‘'parrot’, ţhikā : ţhike ‘contract’, Dibā : Dibe ‘small box’, Dhimā : Dhime ‘show’, titā : tite ‘bitter’, diśā : diśe ‘direction’, piţhā : piţhe ‘cake’, phitā : phite ‘ribbon’, phingā : phinge ‘drongo’, miţhā : miţhe ‘sweet’, mitā : mite ‘pal’, binā : bine ‘without’, michā : miche ‘false’, riţhā : riţhe ‘soap nut’, śikā : śike ‘jute-hanger’, śisā : śise ‘lead’, sidhā : sidhe ‘straight’, hirā


: hire ‘diamond’, himsā : himse ‘jealousy’, etc. Here, a low central vowel is changed into a mid-high front vowel after going through a qualitative-quantitative vowel change, which is quite regular in Bengali speech.

(b) Word-final central low vowel /a/ changes into a front mid-high vowel /e/ due to presence of a high front vowel /i/ in preceding syllable. E.g. kalikā (*kalike): kalke ‘chilum’, kalijā (*kalije): kalje ‘liver’, khaŗikā (*khaŗike): khaŗke ‘toothpick’, gālicā (*gālice): gālce ‘carpet’, cāliśā (*cāliśe): cālśe ‘presbyopia’, nālitā (*nālite) : nālte ‘jute-leaves’, palitā (*palite): palte ‘wick’, bhāginā (*bhāgine): bhāgne ‘sister’s son’, pānisā (*pānise): pānse ‘insipid’, maricā (*marice): marce ‘rust’, sarişā (*sarişe): sarşe ‘mustard’, śajinā (*śajine): śajne ‘horse-radish’, salitā (*salite): salte ‘wick’, etc. These examples are interesting in the sense that in these cases, unless we posit an intermediate stage where vowel harmony takes place, we cannot account for the changes because vowels of same height cannot raise other vowels by one height (Nath 1997: 27). Variation in the above examples is caused by two stages of phonological change. i. In the first stage, a process of vowel rising works where a central low

vowel /a/, at word-final syllable, is raised due to presence of a front high-vowel /i/ in preceding (word-middle) syllable. This is called vowel rising.

ii. In the second stage, a process of syllabic syncope operates where a word-medial front vowel /i/ is lost due to change of trisyllabic words into disyllabic form.

(c) Variation of spelling is also caused due to vowel rising where a central low vowel /a/ at word-final syllable is raised and changed into a back mid-high vowel /o/ due to presence of a back-high vowel /u/ at preceding syllable. E.g. uŗā : uŗo ‘flying’, ukhā : ukho ‘oven’, kucā : kuco ‘fragment’, kuţā : kuţo ‘straw’, kulā : kulo ‘winnow’, khuŗā : khuŗo ‘uncle’, gnuŗā : gnuŗo ‘dust’, gnutā : gnuto ‘shove’, cumā : cumo ‘kiss’, culā : culo ‘oven’, chutā : chuto ‘excuse’, jutā : juto ‘shoe’, jhunā : jhuno ‘ripe’, ţhnuţā : ţhnuţo ‘glum’, Dumā : Dumo ‘cube-shaped’, tulā : tulo ‘cotton’, dunā : duno ‘twice’, dhulā : dhulo ‘dust’, dhunā : dhuno ‘resin’, nulā : nulo ‘handless’, purā : puro ‘full’, phuţā : phuţo ‘hole’, phulā : phulo ‘sullen’, buŗā : buŗo ‘old’, muŗā : muŗo ‘head’, mulā : mulo ‘radish’, rupā : rupo ‘silver’, sutā : suto ‘twine’, hulā : hulo ‘tom-cat’, kumŗā : kumŗo ‘pumpkin’, khucrā : khucro ‘pennies’, ţukrā : ţukro ‘piece’, ţhunkā : ţhunko ‘fragile’, mujrā : mujro ‘rebate’, phulkā : phulko ‘gill’, śuknā : śukno ‘dry’, huŗkā : huŗko ‘latch’, etc.

(d) In case of partial vowel lowering, a front high vowel /i/ at word-final syllable is changed into a back mid-high vowel /o/ because of the presence of a central low vowel /a/ in the preceding (word-medial) syllable. E.g. kşepāmi : kşepāmo ‘eccentricity’, cheblāmi : cheblāmo ‘frivolity’, jeţhāmi :


jeţhāmo ‘precocity’, ţhakāmi : ţhakāmo ‘cheating’, totlāmi : totlāmo ‘stammering’, dekhāmi : dekhāmo ‘showing’, nekāmi : nekāmo ‘feigning’, pākāmi : pākāmo ‘precocity’, pāglāmi : pāglāmo ‘insanity’, bokāmi : bokāmo ‘stupidity’, hyāŋlāmi : hyāŋlāmo ‘greed’, etc.

(e) In a different kind of qualitative-quantitative vowel change, a front high vowel /i/ at word-final syllable is changed into a back mid-high vowel /o/ because of the presence of a front mid-high vowel /e/ in preceding syllable. We can call this as an example of vowel levelling because a vowel /e/ (< /i/) eventually comes to the same level of affecting vowel /e/ in spite of their qualitative variation. E.g. chelemi : chelemo ‘childishness’, etc.

The processes discussed above are mostly considered as examples of vowel harmony (Chatterji 1995: 82-86, Chaki 1996:76) as well as examples of vowel height assimilation (Bhattacharya 2000: 114, Sarkar and Basu 1994: 107). At certain contexts, these are also called as vowel raising, vowel lowering, and vowel levelling under the head vowel alternation to be more accurate in observation and description. In most cases, vowels are changed with regard to their highness or lowness, as conditions apply, under the influence of effecting vowels. Very rarely, however, those effected vowels change into same class of effecting vowels. So, in strict sense, we cannot call these cases as instances of vowel harmony because in case of true vowel harmony both vowels have to be identical in class and feature after completion of the process. Therefore, it is better to call them vowel alternation where levels of affected vowels are changed but not reached to the same levels of affecting vowels.

5.2.6 Vowel by Combination of Consonant and Variant In some words, a vowel grapheme is replaced by a combination of a consonant and it’s variant. Two types of replacement are observed occurring at initial and medial positions of words. (a) The vowel e or its allograph is replaced by yā (a combination of consonant

y and the allograph of ā). E.g. esiD : yāsiD ‘acid’, eţarni : yāţarni ‘attorney’, ekţar : yākţar ‘actor’, keblā : kyāblā ‘fool’, kşepā : kşyāpā ‘eccentric’, cepţā : cyāpţā ‘flat’, celā : cyālā ‘disciple’, ţerā : ţyārā ‘squint eyed’, nekā : nyākā ‘feigning’, phelnā : phyālnā ‘disposable’, phenā : phyānā ‘foam’, reśan : ryāśan ‘ration’, lejā : lyājā ‘tail’, hepā : hyāpā ‘trouble’, etc. The primary motivation behind such orthographic change is to make words true replica of normal Bengali pronunciation. However, because of the lack of a vowel representing /æ/, users employ yā, a combination, which properly represent /æ/ sound.

(b) The vowel grapheme ŗ is replaced by ri (combination of consonant r and allograph of i) while the allograph of vowel ŗ is replaced by a combination of raphalā and allograph of i. This kind of change takes place both at word-initial and medial positions. E.g. ŗktha : riktha ‘treasure’, ŗtī : ritī


‘truth’, ŗju : riju ‘straight’, ŗibhu : ribhu ‘god’, kŗmi : krimi ‘worm’, kŗścān : kriścān ‘Christian’, khŗşţa : khrişţa ‘Christ’, khŗşţān : khrişţān 'Christian', bŗţen : briţen ‘Britain’, bŗţiś : briţiś ‘British’, etc. Since the original pronunciation of vowel ŗ and its allograph is lost in Bengali, these are uttered as /ri/. The loss of discrimination between two utterances motivates language users to replace ŗ or its allograph with ri in words. The notable point is that the process of orthographic replacement does not affect meaning of words12.

5.2.7 Consonant Grapheme by Semivowel Grapheme (a) Sometimes, the bilabial consonant b is replaced by oy (a combination of

the vowel grapheme o and the semivowel grapheme y) at word-medial position. E.g. khābār : khāoyār ‘for eating’, debār : deoyār ‘ for giving’, pābār : pāoyār ‘for getting’, yābār : yāoyār ‘for going’, nebār : neoyār ‘for taking’, śobār : śoyār ‘for lying’, dhobār : dhoyār ‘for washing’, habār : haoyār ‘for being’, etc.

(b) Following same process, the consonant graphemes h, kh and b are replaced by semivowel grapheme y in word-medial position. E.g. bakhāţe : bayāţe ‘spoiled’, gahanā : gaynā ‘ornament’, gohāl : goyāl ‘cowshed’, pohāno : poyāno ‘to pass’, debar : deor ‘brother-in-law’, etc.

This type of change occurs when sādhu words are changed into calit forms. The reason behind such orthographic changes probably lies in phonological change of words. The loss of aspiration and voice quality from consonant graphemes causes h, kh and b to be replaced by y, as the examples have shown.

5.28 Consonant Grapheme by Consonant Grapheme Variation of spelling is also caused due to replacement of consonant by another consonant within a word. It is one of the most common trends in Bengali that take place at any position of word. The pattern of change is divided in two types. In TYPE-I, change takes place between those consonants, which are similar in sound, such as, j : y, ņ : n, ś : ş, ś : s, ş : s, etc.). (a) Replacement takes place between consonants j and y as these are almost

identical in sound. It enables us to replace one by other quite easily. However, it is found that such replacement mostly takes place at word-initial position in which meanings of words are not affected. E.g. jādu : yādu ‘magic’, jādugar : yādugar ‘magician’, jānoyār : yānoyār ‘beast’, juyā : yuyā ‘gamble’, jutsai : yutsai ‘appropriate’, jūş : yūş ‘juice’, jogān : yogān ‘supply’, joŗ : yoŗ ‘pair’, joţāno : yoţāno ‘collect’, joyān : yoyān ‘young’, joţ : yoţ ‘group’, joyāl : yoyāl ‘yoke’, jo : yo ‘ability’, jogāŗ : yogāŗ ‘collection’, etc.


(b) Alveolar ņ is often replaced by dental n in some words. E.g. irāņ : irān ‘Iran’, jharņā : jharnā ‘fountain’, taruņ : tarun ‘young’, naruņ : narun ‘nail cutter’, rāņī : rānī ‘queen’, piņDa : panda ‘lump’, bāņān : bānān ‘spelling’, baņţan : banţan ‘distribution’, saraņi : sarani ‘street’, etc. It makes such a strong impact on Bengali that many clusters constituting alveolar ņ and alveolar stops (e.g. ņţ, ņţh, ņD, etc.) are replaced by clusters constituting dental n and alveolar stop (e.g. nţ, nţh, nD, etc.). It is influenced by English, which is quite rich with clusters comprising dental n and alveolar stops (e.g. center, pant, band, hand, etc.).

(c) Palatal ś is replaced by dental s. E.g. kalśī : kalsī ‘pitcher’, kaśāi : kasāi ‘butcher’, kiśalay : kisalay ‘foliage’, tāmāśā : tāmāsā ‘fun’, paśarā : pasarā ‘kiosk’, paślā : paslā ‘shower’, pharāś : pharās ‘carpet’, maślā : maslā ‘spice’, raśun : rasun ‘garlic’, śajāru : sajāru ‘porcupine’, hābśī : hābsī ‘Negro’, lāś : lās ‘corpse’, etc.

(d) Palatal ś is replaced by retroflex ş. E.g., kaśā : kaşā ‘whip’, niśuti : nişuti ‘dark’, tośak : toşak ‘blanket’, pośāk : poşāk ‘garment’, bālāpoś : bālāpoş ‘blanket’, mūśal : mūşal ‘club’, etc.

(e) Retroflex ş is replaced by dental s. For example, āgaşţ : āgasţ ‘August’, āpoş : āpos ‘compromise’, jiniş : jinis ‘thing’, parişkār : pariskār ‘clear’, bhuşā : bhusā ‘ornament’, māş : mās ‘kind of pulse’, māşā : māsā ‘value’, māşţār : māsţār ‘master’, etc.

Above changes are noted because, barring a few instances, distinction of pronunciation between these consonants is almost lost in Bengali speech. However, notable thing is that either a palatal or a retroflex sibilant is changed into a dental sibilant. But, why the change does not take place in opposite direction (i.e. s > ś or ş) is not known13.

In TYPE-B, replacement takes place between those consonant, which are not similar in sound but which belong to same class (e.g. k : g, k : ŉ, r : l, gh : g, g : k, m : b, etc.). The patterns of replacement of consonants are discussed below. (a) Consonant grapheme k is replaced by consonant grapheme g. Actually,

process of regressive assimilation, which is quite active in Bengali speech, causes this kind of change where an unvoiced consonant is changed into a voiced consonant due to presence of another voiced consonant in following syllable. E.g. dikgaj : diggaj ‘expert’, dikbasan : digbasan ‘naked’, dikbalay : digbalay ‘horizon’, dikbidik : digbidik ‘in all directions’, dikbālā : digbālā ‘goddess of direction’, bākjāl : bāgjāl ‘snare of words’, bākdattā : bāgdattā ‘betrothed’, bākdebī : bāgdebī ‘goddess of learning’.

(b) Consonant grapheme k is replaced by consonant grapheme ŉ. This is also caused due to regressive assimilation where a non-nasal consonant is changed into a nasal consonant because of the presence of a nasal consonant in following syllable. E.g. diknāg : diŉnāg ‘wise man’,


diknirņay : diŉnirņay ‘to decide direction’, dikmaņDal : diŉmaņDal ‘horizon’, bāknişpatti : bāŉnişpatti ‘speak’, bākmay : bāŉmay ‘eloquent’, bāknirupaņ : bāŉnirupaņ ‘speak’, etc.

(c) Sometimes aspirated consonant graphemes are replaced by some non-aspirated consonant graphemes in some words. An aspirated consonant is made deaspirated because of the presence of another aspirated consonant in preceding syllable. E.g. ghughni : ghugni ‘kind of curry’, ākhchār : ākhcār ‘quite often’, dhāndhā : dhāndā ‘profession’, etc.

(d) The following examples are slightly different in nature where an aspirated consonant grapheme is deaspirated because of lack of aspiration of characters used in words. E.g. abujh : abuj ‘not understanding’, Dhelā : Delā ‘piece of stone’, abadhi : abadi (> abdi) ‘up to’, aphis : apis ‘office’, jibh : jib ‘tongue’, etc.

(e) Sometimes, a voiced consonant grapheme is replaced by an unvoiced consonant in words. It is a simple process of devoicing where a voiced consonant is devoiced due to presence of a voiced consonant in preceding syllable. For instance, apārag : apārak ‘unable’, ujbug : ujbuk ‘fool’, ābgāri : āpgāri ‘customs’, abamān : apamān ‘defame’, ākubāku : ākupāku ‘restless’, ādab : ādap ‘manners’, ādabe : ādape ‘in the least’, āpad : āpat ‘danger’, etc.

(f) Sometimes, at word-medial position, consonant m is replaced by consonant b. It is a new kind of replacement where a bilabial nasal consonant is replaced by a bilabial, non-nasal consonant because of the presence of a bilabial non-nasal consonant in following syllable. E.g. nāmba : nābba ‘I shall alight’, nāmo : nābo ‘you alight’, nāmla : nābla ‘he alighted’, nāmte : nābte ‘to alight’, nāmle : nāble ‘alighting’, nāmiye : nābiye ‘alighting’, nāmāte : nābāte ‘to pull down’, etc.

(g) Consonant grapheme r is replaced by consonant grapheme l in some words. E.g. ogrāno : oglāno ‘vomit’, karabh : kalabh ‘elephant calf’, kājar : kājal ‘eye liner’, jaŗur : jaŗul ‘black mole’, bibhor : bibhol ‘engrossed’, bijurī : bijulī ‘lightning’, romaś : lomaś ‘hairy’, etc.

Recently, it is found in some newspapers and magazines, consonant ŗ is

replaced by consonant r in some words. This creates an impression that ŗ is an allograph of r with similar phonetic representation. Its replacement by other does not hamper spelling of words. In reality, they are two separate consonant graphemes in Bengali with unique and distinct sound representation. Therefore, if anybody considers them to be identical in form and function, (s)he can easily be doubted about his/her lack of knowledge of the language.


5.2.9 Consonant Grapheme by a Diacritic Symbol Replacement of a consonant grapheme by a diacritic symbol is also a regular process of spelling variation in Bengali. These are of five types as described below. (a) In some words, consonant grapheme ŉ is replaced by the diacritic symbol ŋ

(anusvār). E.g., aŉka : aŋka ‘mathematics’, aŉkan : aŋkan ‘drawing’, kiŉkar : kiŋkar ‘servant’, gāŉ : gāŋ ‘river’, jaŉgal : jaŋgal ‘forest’, phaŗiŉ : phaŗiŋ ‘insect’, baŉga : baŋga ‘Bengal’, bhāŉ : bhāŋ ‘opium’, raŉ : raŋ ‘colour’, śaŉkā : śaŋkā ‘fear’, śaŉkha : śaŋkha ‘conch shell’, saŉgata : saŋgata ‘justified’, saŉ : saŋ ‘buffoon’, saŉgīt : saŋgīt ‘song’, saŉgha : saŋgha ‘club’, saŉghāt : saŋghāt ‘clash’, etc.

(b) Consonant grapheme m is replaced by the diacritic symbol ŋ (anusvār) in some other words. E.g., āphim : āphiŋ ‘opium’, sambŗta : saŋbŗta ‘controlled’, kimbā : kiŋbā ‘or’, kimbadantī : kiŋbadantī ‘hearsay’, priyambadā : priyaŋbadā ‘sweet-spoken girl’, sambād : saŋbād ‘news’, baśambad : baśaŋbad ‘obedient’, svayambar : svayaŋbar ‘self-choice’, etc.

(c) Consonant grapheme r is replaced by the diacritic symbol reph in some words. E.g., ār(a)ji : ārji ‘request’, ār(a)dāli : ārdāli ‘orderly’, kār(a)tuj : kārtuj ‘cartridge’, kār(a)ban : kārban ‘carbon’, kār(a)peţ : kārpeţ ‘carpet’, jar(a)dā : jardā ‘betel-spice’, jhar(a)nā : jharnā ‘fountain’, dar(a)ji : darji ‘tailor’, tar(a)jamā : tarjamā ‘elaboration’, par(a)dā : pardā ‘curtain’, pār(a)śe : pārśe ‘a kind of fish’, bar(a)gā : bargā ‘rafter’, bar(a)baţi : barbaţi ‘kidney bean’, bhar(a)ti : bharti ‘fulled’, bhar(a)tuki : bhartuki ‘subsidy’, mar(a)d : mard ‘male’, mar(a)ji : marji ‘will’, mār(a)bel : mārbel ‘marble’, mur(a)gi : murgi ‘hen’, sar(a)dār : sardār ‘leader’, sur(a)ki : surki ‘brick-chips’, sur(a)mā : surmā ‘collyrium’, kar(a)tāl : kartāl ‘musical item’, gar(a)jan : garjan ‘roaring', bar(a)śā : barśā ‘spear’, bar(a)şā : barşā ‘rain’, etc.

(d) Consonant grapheme t is sometimes replaced by its diacritic variant ť (khaņData) in some words. E.g. ucit : uciť ‘justified’, ot : oť ‘ambush’, kātlā : kāťlā ‘carp’, nacet : naceť ‘nor’, pātlā : pāťlā ‘thin’, phātnā : phāťnā ‘fishing-float’, madat : madať ‘support’, haţhāt : haţhāť ‘suddenly’, etc.

(e) Consonant grapheme d is sometimes replaced by ť (khaņData), a diacritic variant of t. E.g. āpadkāl : āpaťkāl ‘time of danger’, nirāpad : nirāpať ‘safe’, parşad : parşať ‘corporation’, majud : majuť ‘stored’, hŗdpiņDa : hŗťpiņDa ‘heart’, etc.

We find out two notable types of change in pronunciation of words from the examples given above. In case of (a), (c) and (d) there is no significant change in utterance and meaning of words while in (b) and (e), there is notable change in utterance of words but not in their meanings.


5.2.10 Cluster is replaced by a Consonant Grapheme In case of some words, a consonant grapheme cluster is replaced by a single consonant grapheme. This is of two types. First type of change occurs at word-initial position only while second type of change takes place at word-medial and final position. Although such change does not affect meaning, utterance of words is marginally affected. (a) Cluster kş is replaced by consonant grapheme kh. E.g. kşur : khur ‘razor’,

kşet : khet ‘field’, kşep : khep ‘throw’, kşepā : khyāpā ‘eccentric’, kşeplā : khyāplā ‘a kind of finishing net’, etc.

(b) Cluster ŉg is replaced by consonant grapheme ŉ. E.g. āŉgur : āŉur ‘grape’, āŉgul : āŉul ‘finger’, kāŉgāl : kāŉāl ‘beggar’, cuŉgi : cuŉi ‘octroi’, ţāŉgā : ţāŉā ‘carriage’, ţhoŉgā : ţhoŉā ‘packet’, Dāŉgā : Dāŉā ‘land’, Diŉgi :Diŉi ‘small boat’, noŉgar : noŉar ‘anchor’, phiŉge : phiŉe ‘drongo’, bāŉglā : bāŉlā ‘Bengali’, bhāŉgā : bhāŉā ‘broken’, raŉgīn : raŉīn ‘colourful’, lāŉgal : lāŉal ‘plough’, saŉgīn : saŉīn ‘acute’, sāŉgāt : sāŉāt ‘companion’, hāŉgar : hāŉar ‘shark’, etc.

5.2.11 Consonant grapheme is replaced by a Cluster In a reverse manner, in the following examples, we find that two consecutively occurring consonant graphemes are merged together to form a cluster. E.g. ab(a)dhi : abdi ‘up to’, āb(a)dār : ābdār ‘nag’, āl(i)panā : ālpanā ‘drawing’, ās(a)kārā : āskārā ‘indulgence’, ul(a)kā : ulkā ‘meteor’ ul(a)ţā : ulţā ‘opposite’, kal(i)ke : kalke ‘chillum’, kip(a)ţe : kipţe ‘miser’, nak(a)sā : naksā ‘design’, pal(a)kā : palkā ‘fragile’ pāl(a)ki : pālki ‘palanquin’, pāl(a)ţā : pālţā ‘change’, pān(i)tuyā : pāntuyā ‘kind of sweet-meat’, bal(a)gā : balgā ‘reign’, bal(i)lām : ballām ‘I said’, sab(a)ji : sabji ‘vegetable’, mas(a)karā : maskarā ‘banter’, hāl(a)kā : hālkā ‘light’, etc. This change is a direct impact of speech on writing triggered by certain phonological factors. The loss of latent vowel sound /O/ of first consonant (C1) in a context of two consecutively occurring consonants (C1C2), is instrumental behind formation of an orthographic cluster generated from a phonetic cluster14.

5.3 Addition of Character in Words

Addition of a character is a rare phenomenon in spelling variation of Bengali words. In the corpus, we find only a few words where a character (either an allograph or a consonant grapheme) is added at initial and/or final position of a word. It is shown in three ways:

i. Addition at initial position: C1C2C3 > C1C1C2C3 (C1 is doubled) ii. Addition at medial position: C1C2C3 > C1C2C2C3(C2 is doubled) iii. Addition at final position: C1C2C3 > C1C2C3C3 (C3 doubled)

(a) Sometimes, allograph of vowel grapheme o is added with a nonallographed consonant grapheme. E.g. āţhāra : āţhāro ‘eighteen’, egāra : egāro


‘eleven’, esa : eso ‘come’, kona : kono ‘some’, kara : karo ‘you do’, karchi : korchi 'I am doing’, kāla : kālo ‘black’, garu : goru ‘cow’, jhaŗo : jhoŗo ‘stormy’, dhara : dharo ‘catch’, baŗe : boŗe ‘pawn’, baŗa : baŗo ‘big’, bala : balo ‘you say’, bāra : bāro ‘twelve’, bhāla : bhālo ‘good’, mata : mato ‘like’, şola : şolo ‘sixteen’, basa : bosa : baso : boso ‘you sit’, sara : saro ‘move’, hata : hota : hato : hoto ‘used to’, hala : hola : halo : holo ‘happened’, etc. Addition of the character, however, does not affect the pronunciation or meaning of the words.

(b) In another type of addition, a word-medial or final consonant is doubled (geminated) due to emphasis or stress in pronunciation. E.g. eta : etta ‘so much’, kata : katta ‘how much’, yata : yatta ‘that much’, kothāo : kotthāo ‘nowhere’, bāpi : bāppi ‘father’, bābā : bābbā ‘exclamation’, sakale : sakkale ‘all’, sabāi : sabbāi ‘all’, sābās : sābbās ‘bravo’, etc. In these cases pronunciation of words is duly affected. A close scrutiny may also find finer traits of difference in meaning of words.

5.4 Transposition of Character in Words

Transposition of characters is yet another means of spelling variation of words in Bengali. In this process, a character is shifted from one position to another within words to create spelling variation. The process may be technically shown in the following two ways:

i. At word-medial position: C1V1C2V2C3 > C1V1C3V2C2, and ii. At word-final position: C1V1C2C3V2 > C1V1C3C2V2

As the number of examples is not very large in the corpus, we could site only a few here: kareņu : kaņeru ‘elephant’, bārāņasi : benāras ‘Varanasi’, taroyāl : taloyār ‘sword’, riksā : riskā ‘rickshaw’, loksān : loskān ‘loss’, etc. It generally operates within two consecutive characters in words though it can also operate between two distantly-placed characters. This kind of change is caused due to metathesis — a common phenomenon in Bengali speech. However, in case of metathesis, only sequences of utterance of consonants are interchanged without disturbing their actual orthographic sequence of occurrence in words. But, here the actual orthographic sequence of occurrence of consonant graphemes is interchanged. Meanings of words, however, remain unchanged notwithstanding notable change in their utterances.

6. Conclusion

In this paper, we have presented a systematic discussion on spelling variation of Bengali words as noted in the corpus. Surely, we have found a close interface between pronunciation and orthography for causing so many variations in spelling. It provides necessary information to know how spellings are changed, what kinds of variation generally occur, and reasons that operate behind such


variations. Moreover, it supplies relevant and useful information for selection of correct spelling to be used in automatic spelling checking system, compiling spelling dictionary, developing grammar and text books, preparing language teaching materials and some other related works of linguistics and language technology.

Notes

1. In Scandinavia, the initiative for uniform spelling was initiated officially. In the later half of the last century, the Ministry of Education in Denmark decreed that all old spellings in aa would be replaced with å. Although no Dane is compelled to make change to the new rule, the schools are instructed to teach the new form. Similarly, the Swedish orthography system has had a reasonably thorough revision of spelling about once in each generation (Gleason 1968: 434). Modern French also does not keep itself away from introducing uniformity in spelling.

2. Noah Webster, the maker of the Webster's Dictionary, was an active and influential spelling reformer in America. Venezky (1979) presents a scholarly account of the long history of spelling reform movement in American English.

3. It is claimed that the dictionary is an outcome of much debates and discussions among literary figures, academicians, linguists, educationalists, compositors, and editors coming from different institutions, literary groups, science organisations and publishing houses of West Bengal, Assam, and Bangladesh.

4. However, that this concerted effort has failed to make a major break through is evident from the report published in Bartaman on 7th January 2004.

5. It is needless to say that the proposed guideline of Samsad Spelling Dictionary (1998) will complicate the issue further by providing some new alternatives to those forms already suggested by the Paschimbanga Bangla Akademi, Kolkata.

6. The shoddy picture of wilful anarchy in respect to spelling of words implies that scope for future uniformity is really bleak. This also signifies that until and unless a combined effort is initiated with involvement of all concerned agencies, there is little chance for bringing uniformity in the scenario.

7. However, in the present corpus database there is not a single word, which exhibits nineteen or more spelling variations as it has been observed by Ghosh (1994: 75) in his database.

8. Unfortunately, even the spelling of our beloved city Kolkata is not spared. It is written in four different spellings, such as, kalikātā, kalkātā, kolkātā and kyālkāţā, etc. The same kind of fate also looms large on the spelling of the language Bengali, which registers three alternative spellings, such as, bāŉlā, bāŉgālā and bāŋlā, etc.

9. The letter C stands here for any character used in the Bengali alphabet. It can be a vowel grapheme, a consonant grapheme, a vowel allograph, a consonant graphic variant, a cluster, or even a diacritic symbol.

10. Only one example is found at word-final position (e.g. becārā: becāri ‘unfortunate’) where a central low vowel /a/ at word-final syllable changes into high front vowel /i/ due to presence of a central low vowel /a/ in its preceding syllable.


11. This change directly goes against the regular trend of vowel alternation found in Bengali. This inspires us to argue that the presence of a front high vowel /i/ at distant syllable might have caused the change of central low vowel /a/ in first syllable into front mid-low vowel /æ/ or a front mid-high vowel /e/. It, however, seems impossible, since there are no more examples where an initial vowel is affected by another vowel positioned in a distant syllable.

12. However, only a pair of words is found in the Bengali corpus (e.g. bikŗta ‘distorted’ and bikrita ‘sold’) where such kind of replacement affects meaning of concerned words.

13. It may lead us to argue that we should better remove all palatal and retroflex sibilants from script and use only dental sibilant in all situations. But we are sure that such a radical opinion will be strongly criticised and opposed by others.

14. However, this is not a regular feature of spelling variation in Bengali, since in the text database there are a large number of words in which both the consecutive consonants graphemes are written separately side-by-side despite their formation of a phonetic cluster in utterance.

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