Novel Tools for Sanskrit Learners

[K S Kannan]

Sanskrit, the Highway

There is a rising awareness that we must know more about our heritage than is made possible through our school/college curriculum. In fact, our ill-designed curricula (unlike their counterparts in any other country),  imbue a disregard, if not disdain, regarding our own heritage! If there is one language that has unified India historically as well as geographically, it is Sanskrit, the highway to our vast and benign heritage.

Unfortunately, gone are the days when one could locate a Sanskrit teacher within a mile or less, and consequently, the number of learners of this sacred language is fast dwindling. And add to this, the complexities of modern life - cut throat competition right from school level, time devoured by daily commute, lack of a sense of direction in life even among the elder generations etc. - few are left with the interest, time, patience or even opportunity to learn Sanskrit.

For all its negativities, the modern life-style has also provided some new avenues for acquisition of knowledge, especially in the form of distance-learning. One can sit at home and get an exposure to the best of teachers, and in many modern modes at that, that can make learning thrilling.  But such tools are woefully lacking in quality or quantity or both, when it comes to learning Sanskrit.

Luckily for us, however, Vyoma Linguistic Labs, Bangalore, have come out with many good devices.They have released many useful CD-s, and have a commendable portal for Sanskrit learners. 

While teaching methods of the Pathashalas had their own plus points, the abundant and apt utilisation of audios coupled with picturesque charts and images and animations make for a delightful learning experience in the tools devised here. The Sanskrit learning community, and even more importantly, the Sanskrit teaching community, would do well to take note and make use of these helpful tools for a quicker grasp and  wider reach of the useful contents designed by the knowledgeable staff of Vyoma Labs, run as a non-profit company. They have neat units designed for kids, as well as grown ups looking forward to advanced level content.

Tools for Kids

Their Baalaamodini and Shishugitani cater to kids - even to the grown up kids of today. (Whoever is ignorant is a kid, said Manu :ajno bhavati vai bAlaH).  The Devanagari script is taught here with a moving brush - a veritable teacher in front of you who never gets tired out! From the script, you pass on to an elementary vocabulary suffused with illustrations. The student passes on to the construction of simple sentences, to the accompaniment of the concepts of nouns and verbs, adjectives and adverbs. Learning these is a matter of direct experience, obviating the need for translation (though translation into English also accompanies). Subhashita-s and animated stories make learning a joyful experience.

This product in 14 parts is available on the Google playstore for free: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.vyoma.baalaamodinipremium.Varnamala (this is the first part, there are 13 more parts freely downloadable) ! 

And in Shishugitani, the kids are exposed to many nursery rhymes, some of which are original, while a few are adaptations from well known English rhymes.

Tools for Grown-ups

Taking things to the next level you have separate packages for Sandhi and Samasa, that often scare students with their network of rules and  exceptions. However, tables, animations and examples in abundance, covering 25 Sandhis (carefully leaving out  ones of rare occurrence) here, leave little to be newly searched, and so, equip the student for higher lessons. The concepts of pratyahara, agama, and adesha are also covered. And games are devised to tell the student his scores! As to Samasas, the next level, novel methods have been deployed: rather than isolated words as the stock examples for illustrations, sentence-examples are provided, inspiring the student to a more confident recognition as well as usage. No opportunity is missed in supplying animations so as to vivify the concepts. Some of the advanced concepts are also introduced.

Curriculum Needs

Quite often, students tend to be concerned about their examination scores, and tend to enquire as to whether products that cater to their syllabus-requirements are available. Vyoma Labs have a useful product for them too. There is a module that takes care of all the requirements of learning and examination (for Sanskrit) for CBSE (10th Std.) students. Questions based on text and comprehension, grammar and composition are all catered to. Charts and animations, once again, make things picturesque and unforgettable for the student.

Introducing Panini

To those who want to explore higher levels of learning, useful tools in the form of a recorded Ashtadhyayi of Panini, and Shabdaroopa Sangraha  are provided. The attention paid to accurate pronunciation in both is highly commended. There is no doubt that the services of well-grounded traditional scholars have been made use of here. While the former work introduces one to "the monument of human intelligence" as Panini's work has been called, the latter equips one to get to know all the variety of noun forms by way of a carefully selected set of 220 model declensions placed before him.

The Road Ahead

There is a lot more to be done for the promotion of Sanskrit, and luckily for us, Vyoma Labs has plans for the same. For a non-profit company to make this much of contribution to a field is no easy task. It is only the shraddhaa of the founder, whom I have met, that is the driving force behind all this. 

I have also gathered that they are facing sustenance problems, which is quite understandable given their idealism.  Support, therefore, from lovers of Sanskrit - by way of purchase of their products, and sponsoring some of their much-awaited projects - would go a long way in encouraging a noble cause, the cause, verily, of our own heritage.

For more details their website may be visited at 

www.vyomalabs.in

Product Review by

KSKannan

--

Dr. K.S.Kannan

Professor, 

Centre for Ancient History and Culture,

Jain University

319, 17th Cross, 25th Main,

6th Phase, J P Nagar, Bangalore - 560 078

(Ex-Director, Karnataka Samskrit University)