Kalahandia Odia

Kalahandia^[1] is a dialect of Odia spoken in the region of Kalahandi and Nuapada district of Odisha state in India. Local weekly Odia newspaper such as Arjji and Kalahandi Express publish articles in standard Odia Form and Kalahandia Odia Form.

Kalahandia Odia
Kalahandia
କଳାହାଣ୍ଡିଆ
Native to	India
Region	Odisha (Kalahandi, Nuapada)
Ethnicity	Odias
Language family	Indo-European Indo-Iranian Indo-Aryan Eastern Odia Kalahandia Odia
Writing system	Odia
Language codes
ISO 639-3	–

Distinguishing features

Kalahandia Odia is distinct from standard Odia in terms of vocabulary, spelling and pronunciation. The vocabulary is a little mixture of standard Odia words and Sambalpuri words spoken with a distinct accent and cadence.^[2] Unlike standard Odia, in Kalahandia the final "a" sound is silent (e.g. Ghar ଘର୍ instead of Ghara ଘର). It has a typical vowel sound "ae" (as in marbu kaen ମରବୁ କାଏଁ) which is lacking in standard mainstream Odia. In verbs the "b" sound is replaced with "m" (as in Jimi ଜିମି instead of Jibi ଯିବି). Often the final vowel sound of mainstream Odia is shifted to the middle of a word after modification (e.g. Aji ଆଜି becomes Aej ଆଏଜ୍ and Rajya ରାଜ୍ୟ becomes Raej ରାଏଜ୍). ^[3]

Published work on Kalahandia

• Kalahandia Dhaga
• Kalahandia Dictionary
• Kalahandia Ghumura Songs

Bibliography

• Mund, Parameswar (2020). Kalahandia Shabda Kosha. Delhi: Paschima Publications.
• Pradhan, Dr Tapan Kumar (2020). Kalahandi : The Untold Story. Kohinoor Books. ISBN 9788194579717.