REPORT ON THE CURRENT STATUS OF
UNITED NATIONS ROMANIZATION SYSTEMS FOR GEOGRAPHICAL NAMES
Compiled by the UNGEGN Working Group on Romanization Systems
Version 4.0, March 2016

Punjabi

The United Nations recommended system was approved in 1972 (II/11) and amended in 1977 (III/12), based on a report prepared by D. N. Sharma. The tables and their corrections were published in volume II of the conference reports^1,2.

There is no evidence of the use of the system either in India or in international cartographic products.

Punjabi (Panjābī) in India uses an alphasyllabic script (Gurmukhi) whereby each character represents a syllable rather than one sound. Vowels and diphthongs are marked in two ways: as independent characters (used syllable-initially) and in an abbreviated form, to denote vowels after consonants. The romanization table is unambiguous. The system is mostly reversible but there exist some ambiguities in the romanization of vowels (independent vs. abbreviated characters) and consonants (combinations with subscript consonants vs. character sequences).

Romanization

I. Base characters

1	ੳ	(u)A
2	ਅ	aA
3	ੲ	(i)A
4	ਸ	sB
5	ਹ	h
6	ਕ	ka
7	ਖ	khaB
8	ਗ	gaB
9	ਘ	gha
10	ਙ	ṅa
11	ਚ	cha
12	ਛ	chha
13	ਜ	jaB
14	ਝ	jha
15	ਞ	ña
16	ਟ	ṭa
17	ਠ	ṭha
18	ਡ	ḍa
19	ਢ	ḍha
20	ਣ	ṇa
21	ਤ	ta
22	ਥ	tha
23	ਦ	da
24	ਧ	dha
25	ਨ	na
26	ਪ	pa
27	ਫ	phaB
28	ਬ	ba
29	ਭ	bha
30	ਮ	ma
31	ਯ	ya
32	ਰ	ra
33	ਲ	la
34	ਵ	va
35	ੜ	ṙa

• ^A These characters are used in combination with abbreviated vowel characters: ਉ u, ਊ ū, ਅ a, ਆ ā, ਐ ai, ਔ au, ਇ i, ਈ ī, ਏ e; exceptional variation: ਓ o.
• ^B Dotted variants of the characters: ਸ਼ sha, ਖ਼ ḳha, ਗ਼ g̣a, ਜ਼ za, ਫ਼ fa.

II. Abbreviated vowel characters and other symbols (ਕ stands for any consonant character)

1	ਕ	a
2	ਕਾ	ā
3	ਕਿ	i
4	ਕੀ	ī
5	ਕੁ	u
6	ਕੂ	ū
7	ਕੇ	e
8	ਕੈ	ai
9	ਕੋ	o
10	ਕੌ	au
11	ਕੰ	ṁA
12	ਕਂ	ṁB
13	ੱ	(C)

• ^A Used if it is preceded by short vowels (a, i, u) and ū, excluding the independent vowel character ਉ (u, ū), e.g. ਸੰਗ saṁg, ਸਿੰਗ siṁg, ਬੁੰਦਾ buṁdā, ਬੂੰਦ būṁd, ਇੰਜਨ iṁjan.
• ^B Used in all other occasions, e.g. ਝੋਂਕਾ jhoṁkā.
• ^C Marks doubling of the following consonant: ਨਿੱਕਾ nikkā, ਲੱਭਣਾ labhbhṇā, ਕੁੱਤਾ kuttā, ਹਿੱਸਾ hissā, ਲੱਮਾ lammā.

III. Subscript consonant characters (ਮ stands for any base character)

1	ਮ੍ਹ	-h
2	ਮ੍ਵ	-v
3	ਮ੍ਰ	-r
4	ਮ੍ਯ	-y

Note. Absence of the inherent vowel (-a) is not marked in the spelling in any way except for the combinations with subscript characters and those which are doubled by ੱ (adhaka).

Other systems of romanization

For differences between the UN system and the ISO transliteration standard ISO 15919: 2001 see the section on the romanization of Hindi.

References

1. Second United Nations Conference on the Standardization of Geographical Names. London, 10–31 May 1972. Vol. II. Technical papers. United Nations. New York 1974, pp. 136–138.
2. Third United Nations Conference on the Standardization of Geographical Names. Athens, 17 August – 7 September 1977. Vol. II, Technical papers, pp. 393 etc.