#indian languages

I find it interesting how certain place names are pronounced with retroflex consonants in Marathi, even if they aren’t in the languages it borrowed them from, or the languages spoken in those regions:

Hindi भोपाल (Bhōpāl) → Marathi भोपाळ (Bhōpāḷ)

Hindi लद्दाख़ (Laddāx) → Marathi लडाख (Laḍākh)*

Nepali नेपाल (Nēpāl) → Marathi नेपाळ (Nēpāḷ)

Nepali तिब्बत (Tibbat) → Marathi तिबेट (Tibēṭ)*

Persian اتران (Irân) → Marathi इराण (Irāṇ)

Persian افغانستان (Afǧânestân) → Marathi अफगाणिस्तान (Afgāṇistān)

Contrastingly, Bhutan is called भुटान (Bhuṭān) in Nepali (and འབྲུག་རྒྱལ་ཁབ་ ('Druk Gyal Khab) in Dzongkha), but भूतान (Bhūtān) in Marathi.

I wanted to add IIT Bombay's Marathi Wordnet, but unfortunately, their site doesn't have a search URL I could use.

I also went ahead and did the research to find and add dictionaries for: Hindi, Urdu, Gujarati, Punjabi, Bengali, Tamil, Kannada, Telugu, and Malayalam.

This makes LanguageCrush one of the most robust vocab-reading platforms out there for South Asian languages.

Writing

Script: about, history and development, impact of writing tools in its evolution

Alphabet: multibhashi, wikipedia, wikibooks, edzym

Reading

Textbook: intensive course (archive.org), ncert school books, ap scert school books, ts scert school books, hindi-telugu praimaru, grammar (written in telugu)

Prose: kids’ stories, stories, collected manuscripts, parikini, soundaryalahari, barrister parvateesam, history, translated quran,

Poetry: kinnerasani patalu, movie songs book, maha prasthanam, tyagaraja kirtanalu

Blog/Misc: chandamama kathalu magazine, kavithalu, saaranga magazine, hasam magazine, bharati magazine, swathi weekly, sakshi news

Dictionaries: andhrabharati, tel-eng by sankaranarayana, eng-tel by venkatacharyulu, tel-eng by percival, tel-sans, hin-tel.

Vocabulary

MyLanguages

MeaningInHindi

1000MostCommonWords

proverbs: sametalu (written in telugu)

Grammar

malik’s absolutely goated guide

praveen ragi

vakyam (written in telugu)

Apps

Mango

Multibhashi (android)

HelloTalk

Dasubhashitam (android)

Learn Spoken Telugu From English (android)

Websites

Languages Home

Goethe-Verlag

LearningTelugu

Learn 101

Desi Bantu

YouTube - Native

Telugu teachers: telugu vanam, teach me telugu, pr learning hub,

Beginner level/Kids content: koo koo tv, jum jum tv, paa paa tv, horror planet

General: permit room, sumakka, chai bisket, naa anveshana, my vilage show, ragadi, chitra alochana, thyview, mahathalli, vikramaditya, yevarra meerantha, aye jude, dhethadi, chari not sorry

YouTube - Learners

Mexico: Christina

USA: Kari, Isaac Richards, Manasa (Danya), Omar Crockett

Italy: Franchesca /Telugutalian

Denmark: BigAReact

Poland: Zbigsbujji Chetlur

Sweden: Karl Svanberg

Online Keyboards

lexilogos

typingbaba

branah

Vocabulary Lists with Gender

Food

Rice- भात (masc.) | भात (same form)

Roti- पोळी, चपाती (fem.) | पोळ्या / चपात्या (pl)

Vegetable- भाजी (fem.) | भाज्या (pl)

Fruit- फळ (neut.) | फळं (pl)

Milk- दूध (neut.) | दूध (same form)

Dal- आमटी (fem.) | आमट्या (pl)

Curd- दही (neut.) | दही (same form)

Buttermilk- ताक (neut.) | ताक (same form)

Water- पाणी (neut.) | पाणी (same form)

Places

House- घर (neut.) | घरं (pl)

School- शाळा (fem.) | शाळा (same form)

Market- बाजार (masc.) | बाजार (same form)

Shop- दुकान (neut.) | दुकानं (pl)

Park- उद्यान (neut.) | उद्यानं (pl)

Field- शेत (neut.) | शेतं (pl)

City- शहर (neut.) | शहरं (pl)

Village- गाव (neut.) | गावे (pl)

Nature

Tree- झाड (neut.) | झाडं (pl)

Plant- रोप (neut.) | रोपं (pl)

Flower- फूल (neut.) | फुलं (pl)

River- नदी (fem.) | नद्या (pl)

Sea- समुद्र (masc.) | समुद्र (same form)

Stone- दगड (masc.) | दगड (same form)

Mountain- डोंगर (masc.) | डोंगर (same form)

Sky- आकाश (neut.) | आकाश (same form)

Leaf- पान (neut.) | पानं (pl)

Time

Now- आत्ता

Later- नंतर

Today- आज

Tomorrow- उद्या

Yesterday- काल

Day- दिवस (masc.) | दिवस (same form)

Week- आठवडा (masc.) | आठवडे (pl)

Month- महिना (masc.) | महिने (pl)

Year- वर्ष (neut.) | वर्षे (pl)

Morning- सकाळ (fem.)

Afternoon- दुपार (fem.)

Evening- संध्याकाळ (fem.)

Night- रात्र (fem.) | रात्री (pl)

Household Objects

Table- टेबल (neut.) | टेबलं (pl)

Chair- खुर्ची (fem.) | खुर्च्या (pl)

Bed- खाट (fem.) | खाटा (pl)

Door- दरवाजा (masc.) | दरवाजे (pl)

Window- खिडकी (fem.) | खिडक्या (pl)

Wall- भिंत (fem.) | भिंती (pl)

Cupboard- कपाट (neut.) | कपाटं (pl)

Song of the Day-

Gara Gara, from Yuntum (2018)

(other than Urdu)

Boy, did this ask take me down a rabbit hole. I have only studied Hindi and some Urdu, and my exposure to other Indian languages is mostly through fusion film songs that mix various languages. So if I make a mistake here, please feel free to expand and correct me!

India is home to a diverse range of languages, many of which share roots with Hindi in the Indo-Aryan language family. While some are highly mutually intelligible, others are more distinct but still share structural and lexical similarities.

When comparing languages with common roots, it's often helpful to look at the words that are probably the oldest, such as those for home, food, or basic verbs. Here's a comparison of Hindi and Urdu to six other Indian languages with three example sentences.

What we can see here:

Shared vocabulary: Words like घर, किताब and खाना are mostly consistent across the board and would likely be understood by many speakers of these languages. Words like पुस्तक, छोरी and भोजन are also familiar to Hindi speakers, though they might be considered more formal, regional or specific.

Grammar: all these languages follow the Subject-Object-Verb (SOV) sentence structure. Even if you encounter an unfamiliar word, this consistent syntax helps understanding and contextually deducing its meaning. Knowing where nouns, verbs and adverbs are likely placed in a sentence can be a huge advantage when learning or comparing these languages.

Script: Hindi uses Devanagari, Urdu uses Nastaliq or Naskh, Punjabi uses Gurmukhi in India and Shahmukhi (Perso-Arabian script similar to Urdu) in Pakistan. Gujarati has its own script, and others, like Maithili and Bhojpuri, also use Devanagari with minor regional tweaks.

So the answer to your question is: well yes, but actually no.

You can test how much you understand by listening to these songs! Some of them have a bit of Hindi influence or shared vocabulary mixed into them:

Punjabi

Rajasthani

Bhojpuri

Maithili

Marathi

Gujarati