 APPENDIX B--
REPORT OF THE EXPERT COMMITTEE
 ON UNIFORM BRAILLE CODE

After our preliminary meeting with you on the 18th instant we have been able to up a chart of Uniform Indian Braille, and herewith submit the same for the consideration of the Expert Committee with a few explanatory notes.

2. We have indicated the manner in which the Code is to be used for the alphabets of the three different groups of Indian languages with the help of one alphabet in each group. but we hope that the Central Advisory Board of Education- will publish the Code with all Indian alphabets printed, so that the Code will be available for. the use of every school in India without any doubt or difficulty. When that stage is arrived we shall do our best to help in the correct, publication of the Code.

3. We have based Our Code on the recommendations of the Uniform Braille Committee, and have sought to carry them out as far as it is possible. We were directed to retain the original seven line arrangement of Braille, and in doing that, we regret that we have not been able to take advantage of the horizontal symmetry which would have suited Indian languages better. We have, therefore, made only a very limited use of Principle II (iv) in the case of the Perso-Arabic alphabets where letters having the same sound are given similar front and back signs, so that if a beginner should find it, difficult to distinguish the front signs of line 7, he should yet produce the correct sounds.

4. In ordinary writing the short vowel (a) is supposed to be inherent in the consonants of the Indo-Aryan and Dravidian languages when fully written. They will always be fully written in Braille, and we suggest that the short vowel (a) should be written each time it occurs rather than that the sign of virama should be written when a consonant is moved by a vowel. We have, therefore provided no sign for virama or Jazm. This arrangement will make the code more scientific and more uniform. It will also lead to greater accuracy in reading and writing.

5. The Dravidian languages require two extra vowels, the short e and o, which are not used in the Indo-Aryan and the Perso-Arabic alphabets. These have been provided in line 5 and assigned signs similar to those used for the corresponding long vowels. As a teacher in each language will chose the order in which he teaches the alphabet on modern principles of education, the separation of these vowels from the main scheme will present no difficulty.

6. We recommend that for the Perso-Arabic alphabets the 10 vowels required should have the same signs as are provided for the Indo-Aryan alphabets as has been the practice up to now . This arrangement is necessitated by reasons of uniformity and has besides other advantage as well. If spelt out as the vowels are done for the sighted in these languages they will require two or even three signs for each vowel, and economy of writing space is a matter of paramount, importance in Braille.

We have provided separate signs for all the consonants required by these alphabets in spite of the fact that some of them have the same sounds as others already provided because these will be useful for the study of Arabic and the reading and writing of the Quran.

7. No separate signs have been provided for Tashdid and Tanwin. For the former it is suggested that the consonant concerned should be written twice as in case of the sighted.

8. For classical studies in the Perso-Arabic group of languages we suggest that the sign for the long vowel (a) should be used for Alif and the same written twice for Alifmadd using the short vowels (a), (i) and (u) for Zabar, Zer and Pesh respectively.

9. For purposes of teaching we recommend that the letters of the alphabet be named as they are in the language as taught to the sighted.

10. Indian Uniform Braille shall be written from right to left and read from left to right .

11. We hope this Code will meet the approval of our learned colleagues and will solve the problem of the Uniform Code for India.

The Devanagri characters have been used to represent the Indo- Aryan group of languages. Where additional letters are required they are taken from Bengali and are marked B.

Kanarese letters have been used for Dravidian group of languages. Additional letters have been marked Ta fer Tamil and Te for Telugu.

Urdu is used as the base for the Perso-arabic alphabets. Sindhi, Push to or Arabic letters are marked S., P, and A. respectively.

APPENDIX B-- REPORT OF THE EXPERT COMMITTEE ON UNIFORM BRAILLE CODE