Origins

The name "Sindhi" is derived from the Sanskrit síndhu, the original name of the Indus River, along whose delta Sindhi is spoken.^[5]

Like other languages of the Indo-Aryan family, Sindhi is descended from Old Indo-Aryan (Sanskrit) via Middle Indo-Aryan (Pali, secondary Prakrits, and Apabhramsha). 20th century Western scholars such as George Abraham Grierson believed that Sindhi descended specifically from the Vrācaḍa dialect of Apabhramsha (described by Markandeya as being spoken in Sindhu-deśa, corresponding to modern Sindh) but later work has shown this to be unlikely.^[6]

Early Sindhi (2nd–16th centuries)

Literary attestation of early Sindhi is sparse. Sindhi is first mentioned in historical records within the Nātyaśāstra, a text on dramaturgy thought to have been composed between 200 B.C. and 200 A.D. The earliest written evidence of Sindhi as a language can be found in a translation of the Qur’an into Sindhi dating back to 883 A.D.^[4] Historically, Isma'ili religious literature and poetry in India, as old as the 11th century CE, used a language that was closely related to Sindhi and Gujarati. Much of this work is in the form of ginans (a kind of devotional hymn).^[7][8]

Sindhi was the first Indo-Aryan language to be in close contact with Arabic and Persian following the Umayyad conquest of Sindh in 712 CE.

Medieval Sindhi (16th–19th centuries)

Medieval Sindhi literature is of a primarily religious genre, comprising a syncretic Sufi and Advaita Vedanta poetry, the latter in the devotional bhakti tradition. The earliest known Sindhi poet of the Sufi tradition is Qazi Qadan (1493–1551). Other early poets were Shah Inat Rizvi (c. 1613–1701) and Shah Abdul Karim Bulri (1538–1623). These poets had a mystical bent that profoundly influenced Sindhi poetry for much of this period.^[7]

Another famous part of Medieval Sindhi literature is a wealth of folktales, adapted and readapted into verse by many bards at various times and possibly much older than their earliest literary attestations. These include romantic epics such as Sassui Punnhun, Sohni Mahiwal, Momal Rano, Noori Jam Tamachi, Lilan Chanesar, and others.^[9]

The greatest poet of Sindhi was Shah Abdul Latif Bhittai (1689/1690–1752), whose verses were compiled into the Shah Jo Risalo by his followers. While primarily Sufi, his verses also recount traditional Sindhi folktales and aspects of the cultural history of Sindh.^[7]

The first attested Sindhi translation of the Quran was done by Akhund Azaz Allah Muttalawi (1747–1824) and published in Gujarat in 1870. The first to appear in print was by Muhammad Siddiq in 1867.^[10]

Modern Sindhi (1843–present)

In 1843, the British conquest of Sindh led the region to become part of the Bombay Presidency. Soon after, in 1848, Governor George Clerk established Sindhi as the official language in the province, removing the literary dominance of Persian. Sir Bartle Frere, the then commissioner of Sindh, issued orders on August 29, 1857, advising civil servants in Sindh to pass an examination in Sindhi. He also ordered the use of Sindhi in official documents.^[11] In 1868, the Bombay Presidency assigned Narayan Jagannath Vaidya to replace the Abjad used in Sindhi with the Khudabadi script. The script was decreed a standard script by the Bombay Presidency thus inciting anarchy in the Muslim majority region. A powerful unrest followed, after which Twelve Martial Laws were imposed by the British authorities. The granting of official status of Sindhi along with script reforms ushered in the development of modern Sindhi literature.

The first printed works in Sindhi were produced at the Muhammadi Press in Bombay beginning in 1867. These included Islamic stories set in verse by Muhammad Hashim Thattvi, one of the renowned religious scholars of Sindh.^[9]

The Partition of India in 1947 resulted in most Sindhi speakers ending up in the new state of Pakistan, commencing a push to establish a strong sub-national linguistic identity for Sindhi. This manifested in resistance to the imposition of Urdu and eventually Sindhi nationalism in the 1980s.^[12]

The language and literary style of contemporary Sindhi writings in Pakistan and India were noticeably diverging by the late 20th century; authors from the former country were borrowing extensively from Urdu, while those from the latter were highly influenced by Hindi.^[13]

Phonology

Sindhi has a relatively large inventory of both consonants and vowels compared to other Indo-Aryan languages.^[49] Sindhi has 46 consonant phonemes and 10 vowels.^{[50][clarification needed]} The consonant to vowel ratio is around average for the world's languages at 2.8.^[51] All plosives, affricates, nasals, the retroflex flap, and the lateral approximant /l/ have aspirated or breathy voiced counterparts. The language also features four implosives.

Nouns

Sindhi nouns distinguish two genders (masculine and feminine), two numbers (singular and plural), and five cases (nominative, vocative, oblique, ablative, and locative). This is a similar paradigm to Punjabi. Almost all Sindhi noun stems end in a vowel, except for some recent loanwords. The declension of a noun in Sindhi is largely determined from its grammatical gender and the final vowel (or if there is no final vowel). Generally, -o stems are masculine and -a stems are feminine, but the other final vowels can belong to either gender.

The different paradigms are listed below with examples.^[55] The ablative and locative cases are used with only some lexemes in the singular number and hence not listed, but predictably take the suffixes -ā̃ / -aū̃ / -ū̃ (ABL) and -i (LOC).

A few nouns representing familial relations take irregular declensions with an extension in -r- in the plural. These are the masculine nouns ڀاءُ bhāu "brother", پِيءُ pīu "father", and the feminine nouns ڌِيءَ dhīa "daughter", نُونھَن nū̃hã "daughter-in-law", ڀيڻَ bheṇa "sister", ماءُ māu "mother", and جوءِ joi "wife".^[55]

Pronouns

Numerals

Postpositions

Most nominal relations (e.g. the semantic role of a nominal as an argument to a verb) are indicated using postpositions, which follow a noun in the oblique case. The subject of the verb takes the bare oblique case, while the object may be in nominative case or in oblique case and followed by the accusative case marker کي khe.^[57]

The postpositions are divided into case markers, which directly follow the noun, and complex postpositions, which combine with a case marker (usually the genitive جو jo).

Vocabulary

According to historian Nabi Bux Baloch, most Sindhi vocabulary is from ancient Sanskrit. However, owing to the influence of the Persian language over the subcontinent, Sindhi has adapted many words from Persian and Arabic. It has also borrowed from English and Hindustani. Today, Sindhi in Pakistan is slightly influenced by Urdu^{[citation needed]}, with more borrowed Perso-Arabic elements, while Sindhi in India is influenced by Hindi^{[citation needed]}, with more borrowed tatsam Sanskrit elements.^[58]

Laṇḍā scripts

Laṇḍā-based scripts, such as Gurmukhi, Khojki, and the Khudabadi script were used historically to write Sindhi.

Khudabadi

Quick Facts Khudabadior Sindhi, ISO 15924 ...

Khudabadi or Sindhi
ISO 15924
ISO 15924	Sind (318), ​Khudawadi, Sindhi
Unicode
Unicode alias	Khudawadi
Unicode range	U+112B0–U+112FF

Close

The Khudabadi alphabet was invented in 1550 CE, and was used alongside other scripts by the Hindu community until the colonial era, where the sole usage of the Arabic script for official purposes was legislated.

The script continued to be used on a smaller scale by the trader community until the Partition of India in 1947.^[64]

ə	a	ɪ	i	ʊ	uː	e	ɛ	o	ɔ
k	kʰ		ɡ	ɠ			ɡʱ		ŋ
c	cʰ		ɟ	ʄ			ɟʱ		ɲ
ʈ	ʈʰ		ɖ	ɗ			ɽ	ṛ	ɳ
t	tʰ		d				dʱ		n
p	pʰ	f	b	ɓ			bʱ		m
j	r	l	ʋ
ʂ		s	h

Perso-Arabic script

During the British raj, a variant of the Persian alphabet was adopted for Sindhi in the 19th century. The script is used in Pakistan and India today. It has a total of 52 letters, augmenting the Persian with digraphs and eighteen new letters (ڄ ٺ ٽ ٿ ڀ ٻ ڙ ڍ ڊ ڏ ڌ ڇ ڃ ڦ ڻ ڱ ڳ ڪ‎) for sounds particular to Sindhi and other Indo-Aryan languages. Some letters that are distinguished in Arabic or Persian are homophones in Sindhi.

Devanagari script

In India, the Devanagari script is also used to write Sindhi.^[65] A modern version was introduced by the government of India in 1948; however, it did not gain full acceptance, so both the Sindhi-Arabic and Devanagari scripts are used. In India, a person may write a Sindhi language paper for a Civil Services Examination in either script.^[67] Devanagari was seen as the most practical option for Sindhi language in India.^[1] Diacritical bars below the letter are used to mark implosive consonants, and dots called nukta are used to form other additional consonants.

Roman Sindhi

The Sindhi-Roman script or Roman-Sindhi script is the contemporary Sindhi script usually used by the Sindhis when texting messages on their mobile phones.^[68][69]

Software

By 2001, Abdul-Majid Bhurgri^{[failed verification]} had coordinated with Microsoft to develop Unicode-based Software in the form of the Perso-Arabic Sindhi script which afterwards became the basis for the communicated use by Sindhi speakers around the world.^[70] In 2016, Google introduced the first automated translator for Sindhi language.^[71][72] Later on in 2023 an offline support was introduced by Google Translate.^[73][74] Which was followed by Microsoft Translator strengthening support in May of same year.^[75][76]

In June 2014, the Khudabadi script of the Sindhi language was added to Unicode, However as of now the script currently has no proper rendering support to view it in unsupported devices.