A critical and analytical review of Urdu-Sindhi dictionaries

Abstract

Lexicography is a professional activity as well as an academic field concerned with dictionaries and various kinds of reference work. The importance of a dictionary as a reference book for pedagogical purpose is universally accepted.

The practice of writing lexicon in Sindhi language started in due course during the British rule in Sindh. Before it, bilingual dictionaries of Persian-Sindhi and Arabic-Sindhi words and trilingual dictionaries showing the substitutes of “Persian-Arabic-Sindhi” words were in currency for reference.  After coming into being of Pakistan Sindhi language came into direct interaction with Urdu language because Karachi, the biggest and main city of Sindh, was made capital of Pakistan and Urdu was declared as a national language of the country. Majority of Urdu-speaking population besides Karachi settled down in other big cities of Sindh as well which included Hyderabad, Sukkur and Mirpur Khas, this resulted into frequent contact of Sindhi people with Urdu language. On the other hand many words of Arabic, Persian, Sanskrit, Hindi and Turkish languages were part of Urdu language of which many were already being spoken and written in Sindhi language as well, hence, the lexical similarities existed in both languages to the considerable extent. In this given perspective, the bilingual dictionaries of Urdu and Sindhi were prepared so that the speakers of both the languages should be brought closer to each other. In this context the first ever step was taken by Ibn-e-Illyas who compiled a dictionary entitled “Naeen Urdu-Sindhi Lughaat” (The New Urdu-Sindhi Dictionary) which was published in 1950 and made public for reference. Afterwards, Dr. Nabi Bux Khan Baloch, Dr. Ghulam Mustafa Khan, Dr. Abul Laith Siddiqui, Jamal Rind, Abdul Sattar Baloch, Dr. Badar Dhamraho, Muhammad Usman Abbasi, Rahim Bux Lund and Ali Sher Qureshi contributed in this field and thus, brought these two languages even more closely to each other.

In this paper, I have presented critical review of Urdu-Sindhi dictionaries. In this study, the microstructure of dictionaries with particular emphasis on presentation of meaning, pronunciation and grammatical information have been studied. Research paradigm for this study is qualitative and content analysis is used as the research tool. It is found that these dictionaries qualify as a good work and carry many merits in one aspect or in another. This sort of research work has not been done previously in Sindhi language, this shall not only help improvise already published dictionaries but also inspire to find out and adopt new ways and methods for preparing qualitative bilingual dictionaries.