Urdu Braille

According to Unesco (2013),[1] there are different braille alphabets for Urdu in India and in Pakistan. The Indian alphabet is based on national Bharati Braille, while the Pakistani alphabet is based on Persian Braille.

Pakistani Urdu Braille
Type
LanguagesUrdu (in Pakistan)
Parent systems
Print basis
Urdu alphabet
Indian Urdu Braille
Type
Alphabet (?)
LanguagesUrdu (In India)
Parent systems
Print basis
Devanagari

Differences from Persian and Bharati Braille

Besides the addition of Urdu-specific consonants analogous to the additional letters in the print Urdu alphabet compared to the Persian alphabet, Pakistani Urdu Braille differs from Persian Braille in the transcription of the print letter ژ ž, which is written as a digraph in Urdu braille rather than as Persian ⠬, which in Urdu is used for ڈ ḍ.

Indian Urdu Braille differs from other Bharati braille alphabets in having several letters borrowed from Persian, such as ⠟ for ق q (Bharati kṣ), ⠱ for ح ḥ (Bharati jñ), and ⠷ for ع ‘ (Bharati ḻ). Another such letter, ⠭ for خ x, is shared with Gurmukhi Braille ਖ਼ x but with no other Bharati alphabet, where ⠭ is otherwise the vowel o.

Alphabets
Note: It is not clear if these are written right-to-left or left-to-right. The directionality of some of the digraphs may have gotten confused.
PrintPakistanIndia
ا–(?)
آā
بb
بھbh
پp
پھph
تt
تھth
ٹṭ[2]
ٹھṭh[2]
ثṯ /s/
جj
جھjh
چc
چھch
حḥ
خx
دd
دھdh[3]
ڈḍ
ڈھḍh[3]
ذḏ /z/
رr
ڑṛ
ڑھṛh[3]
زz
ژž[4]
سs
شš
صṡ /s/
ضḋ /z/
طṫ /t/
ظż /z/
ع‘
غğ
فf
قq
کk
کھkh[3]
گg
گھgh[3]
لl
مm
نn
ں(nasal)
وv/wv
ū
ō
au
هh
ء’(?)
یyy
ī
ےēē
ai
َ◌a(?)
ِ◌i(same?)
ُ◌u(same?)
ّ◌(dbl)(?)

It is not clear if vowels in Indian Urdu Braille follow pronunciation and their Devanagari Braille equivalents, or print orthography.

Contractions

Pakistani Urdu Braille has several contractions beyond the aspirated consonants:

كو ⠻, سا ⠑, نا ⠔,[5] و ن گ ⠶, نا ⠢,[5] نے ⠼, يا ⠽, لا ⠧, بے ⠤, اء ⠈.[6]

Punctuation

Basic punctuation in Pakistan is the same as in India. See Bharati Braille#Punctuation.

gollark: I don't really get the point of changing it *anyway*, but it should at least look vaguely CC-ish.
gollark: That would also look weird. It's not even using the actual CC palette as far as I can tell.
gollark: I don't really like it, it looks weird.
gollark: Falling back to them if there's no other one might make sense, though.
gollark: You could at least make it fallback to the switchcraft ones.

See also

References
  1. World Braille Usage, UNESCO, 2013
  2. Or perhaps the reverse, ⠕ ṭ and ⠪ ṭh. (Combinatorial Image Analysis: 12th International Workshop, IWCIA 2008, p 345ff.)
  3. Not specifically attested. Assumed from the assignment of ⠦ to the print digraph element ھ.
  4. Or perhaps a single glyph, ⠽ ž (Combinatorial Image Analysis: 12th International Workshop, IWCIA 2008, p 345ff), though according to Unesco, that's the braille glyph for يا yā.
  5. A duplication in the Unesco reference, presumably an error. ⠔ may be ان instead, in which case ⠑ is probably also a mistake for اس. It appears that Unesco got the letters backwards for several of the contractions.
  6. Written hamza–alif, but labeled alif–hamza.
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