Kà ©á¹Âux Bannà(), or the Kurukh Banna or simply Banna Lipi is an alphasyllabic neography used for writing the Kurukh language of the Oraon people in eastern India. It was invented by Basudeo Ram Khalkho based on Brahmic writing systems, and was released in 1991. The Banna script is written left-to-right and is composed of 48 primary characters and 10 numerals.
Since its creation in 1991, the Banna script has been revised twice, first in 1995, and latest in 1998. The script is mostly used in northern Odisha, with some users also in Jharkhand and West Bengal. The Banna script is the medium of instruction in a few Kurukh language schools. A number of educational materials, newspapers, magazines and literary works have been published in the Banna script. Some Kisan people have also adopted the script.
The Banna script has a 24% resemblance with northern Indic scripts. It is one of two competing scripts used to write the Kurukh language, the other being the alphabetical Tolong Siki, another neography which developed independently.
Demands have been made for the Banna script along with the Kurukh language to be given constitutional recognition in India. The script has also been proposed for Unicode inclusion.
The word bannÃÂ () refers to the 'designs, figures and patterns' made on traditional clothes and tattooed on skin.
The earliest documented version of the Banna script dates back to 1991 in an unpublished primer, the Kà ©á¹Âux Banna Lipi AràBakka Gaá¹Âhan Part-1 (Kurukh Banna Script and Orthography Part-1), handwritten by Basudeo Ram Khalkho himself. The script was subsequently revised in 1995, and then latest in 1998, which remains the current version.
The 1991 version, that is, the very first version of the Banna script, with the arrangement of letters called toá¹Âan, introduced with 10 vowels (and 9 vowel diacritics) along with the á¹Âippàsign (anusvara) and the selàsign (prolongation sign). It also included a glottal stop sign called talÃÂ, a halant (virama), and a visarga. This version had 31 consonants, and one ligature for tr [têr]. Notably, this version had only one nasal consonant, the na . Another notable difference from the current version is that vowels were called tÃÂl toá¹ and consonants were called rayàtoá¹ in this initial version.
The Banna script was revised in 1995, reshaping a few vowels, a few vowel diacritics, the prolongation sign, the glottal stop sign and a few consonants. The prolongation sign was now called raá¹ÂÃÂ, and the glottal stop sign was now called phaá¹ÂÃÂ. This revision notably introduced the candoá¹Âippàsign (chandrabindu) for vowel nasalization. The halant (virama) was re-positioned. New consonants were added, like the á¹£a , and nasal consonants like á¹ a , the ña , and the á¹Âa . A notable addition was the consonant xa introduced for the first time in this script with the 1995 revision. Two new ligatures were added for ká¹£a [kÃÂ] and gya [gj]. The number of consonants now totaled to 36. The earliest documented version of numerals in the Banna script is from a 1995 unpublished primer, the Kà ©á¹Âux Lipi Ṭuá¹ÂnàPaá¹Âhnà(Kurukh Script Writing Reading) by Basudeo Ram Khalkho, which included the digits from 0 to 9.
In October 1997, a two-day conference was organized by the Interstate Kurukh (Oraon) Samaj Vikas Parishad in Jamshedpur, where the inventors of both Kurukh scripts were present, Basudeo Ram Khalkho (of the Kurukh Banna) and Dr. Narayan Oraon (of the Tolong Siki). A major topic of discussion was on the language and its script. The conference was inconclusive on choosing one script out of the contesting two, and that task remains incomplete till date.
The Banna script was last revised in 1998, and this version remains in use till date. A number of vowels, vowel diacritics, consonants were reshaped. Numerals too were reshaped for compatibility with seven-segment displays. The á¹Âippàsign (anusvara) was re-positioned. The visarga sign was removed. Notably, a nukta sign was introduced in this version. The prolongation sign was renamed back to selÃÂ, and the glottal stop sign has since been called heckÃÂ. With the 1998 revision, vowels are called sarah toá¹ and consonants are called harah toá¹Â.
In October 2012, the Banna script was consecrated with rituals at the Adi Dharam Parha Manda at Balijori, Rourkela. On the same occasion, the Kurukh Bhasha Vikas Parishad (Kurukh Language Development Council) was established, which pledged to promote and develop the Kurukh language and the Banna script.
In 2016âÂÂ19, the Kurukh Banna script was digitized by Shyam Murmu, who also designed multiple fonts for it. In 2023 and 2024, proposals were made to the Unicode Consortium for encoding the script.
In recent years, tribal organizations like the All India Kurukh Parha Yubak Sangh (AIKPYS) in Rourkela have been demanding official recognition of the Kurukh language in Banna script in the Indian constitution's eighth schedule.
The Banna script follows the arrangement order of most BrÃÂhmic scripts, arranging its letters based on phonetic characteristics like the manner and place of articulation. This arrangement is called the toá¹Âan.
The vowels are called sarah toá¹Â. There are 12 independent vowel characters with 11 diacritics:
Out of the 12 independent vowel characters, 2 are diphthongs and another 2 are just representations of diacritics. All 12 characters except 1 (the vowel a), have a vowel sign that can be affixed to the consonants. Apart from the above 12 vowels and corresponding 11 diacritics, there are also 3 other diacritics grouped under the sarah toá¹Â:
The consonants are called harah toá¹ and have an inherent vowel a (). There are 36 consonant characters, which are arranged so:
Schwa deletion: While the inherent vowel a (schwa ) of a consonant can be muted or deleted by explicitly marking the halant sign after it, such is not always done. Even in the non-usage of the halant, implicitly in the Banna script, the final schwa is always deleted, while the middle schwa is both sometimes retained and sometimes deleted.
The table below shows the consonant ka with combined with diacritics and their transliteration. Vowels in their independent form on the top and in their corresponding diacritic combined with the consonant on the bottom.
In the absence of any diacritic affixed, the consonant takes the form of being inherently combined with the vowel a.
The numbers, called gan or ganatë, are:
The Kurukh Banna script does not have Unicode support yet. A preliminary proposal to encode the script to Unicode was made in May 2023, which was revised in February 2024.
A challenge expressed by the Unicode Technical Committee in dealing with proposals for encoding the Kurukh Banna script is the parallel use of another neography, the Tolong Siki for the same language. In an interstate conference of Kurukh people held in 1997, the issue of selecting one script out of the two for standardization remained inconclusive. In later years, the Tolong Siki received official recognition in the Indian states of Jharkhand (in 2003) and West Bengal (in 2017), while the Banna script lacks official support till date. Meanwhile, the proposal to encode Tolong Siki has already been accepted by the Unicode Technical Committee and received support in Unicode version 17.0, while Kurukh Banna remains in the proposal stage.