A1 · Devanagari and the sounds of Hindi
The hidden a, and when it falls silent
the inherent vowel and its deletion
Every consonant carries a written a, but at the end of a word and often in the middle it is not said.
At a glance
- Remember
- Write the a, do not say it: ghar, kamra, ladki — the letter stays and the sound goes.
- Form
- घरfinal a silent: house
- Signal words
- घर
- कमरा
- लड़की
- बोलता
- Trap
- Wrong:यह कम्रा छोटा है।Right:यह कमरा छोटा है।
Your turn
10 exercises on this topic. Your answers are checked in the browser; none of them leaves your device.
The form
| final a silent: house | घर |
| final a silent: name | नाम |
| middle a silent: room | कमरा |
| middle a silent: girl | लड़की |
| one a kept, one dropped: to understand | समझना |
| in verb forms: speaks | बोलता |
The rules one by one
The form this topic is about
A consonant without a sign carries a short a.
खाने में नमक कम है।There is not enough salt in the food.
At the end of a word that a is silent.
हमारा घर बड़ा है।Our house is big.
Before a syllable with a full vowel, an a in the middle usually falls silent too.
यह कमरा छोटा है।This room is small.
Verb endings follow the same rule: boltā, not bolatā.
वह हिंदी बोलता है।He speaks Hindi.
Example sentences
हमारी बस लेट है।Our bus is late.
लड़की स्कूल जाती है।The girl goes to school.
मेरा कमरा ऊपर है।My room is upstairs.
आज बहुत गरमी है।It is very hot today.
वह रोज़ अख़बार पढ़ता है।He reads the newspaper every day.
बच्चे ध्यान से सुनते हैं।The children listen carefully.
5 more example sentences
सड़क चौड़ी है।The road is wide.
मेरा मतलब यह नहीं था।That is not what I meant.
यह पलंग नया है।This bed is new.
वह हमेशा देर से आता है।He always comes late.
मैं चाबी यहाँ रखता हूँ।I keep the key here.
The trap English speakers fall into
Watch out
Writing from the ear, English speakers hear kamrā and put a half letter where the a is silent. Hindi spelling does not record the silence: the word is कमरा, and the reader drops the a. The same goes for लड़की, बोलता and every word like them.
The full explanation
Read it all · about 1 min
A consonant letter without a vowel sign carries a short a: कis kaकमलis ka-ma-l But Hindi does not say all of these a’s. At the end of a word the last one is silent: घरis gharनामnāmकमलkamal A word that ends in a consonant sound is still written with the full letter; the silence is a rule of reading, not of spelling.
The same happens in the middle of a word. When a consonant with its hidden a stands between two syllables that both have a vowel, and a full vowel follows, the a usually drops: कमरा (room) is kamrā, not kamarā; लड़की (girl) is laṛkī; अपना (own) is apnā. The same rule shortens verb forms: बोलताis boltāसुनतीsuntī
The rule works from the end of the word backwards, so a longer word can keep one a and lose the next: समझना (to understand) is samajhnā — the a after म stays, the one after झ goes. Words taken from Sanskrit sometimes keep an a the rule would drop.
You do not have to calculate any of this while reading: the transliteration under each word on this site shows what is said. What matters is the other direction. When you write a word you have heard, write the full letter — कमरा — and not a half letter for the silent a.
A closer look
Where the rule stops
The silent a is a rule of thumb, not a law. Words taken from Sanskrit, especially learned ones, often keep it: प्रगति (progress) is pragati. In a compound the rule applies to each part on its own: घरवाला is ghar-vālā. And a few short words keep a final a: न (not) is na.
This is why the site computes the transliteration from rules and also keeps a list of words that are said differently. When the line under a word looks surprising, it is usually right.
Worth knowing (2)
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Two a’s in one word
The rule is applied from the end of the word. In समझता (understands) the a after झ falls before ता, and the a after म stays, because it now stands before two consonants: samajhtā.
मैं यह समझता हूँ।I understand this.
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Names follow the rule too
Names written with a final consonant end in a consonant sound: राम is Rām, कमल Kamal, अर्जुन Arjun. The English spellings “Rama” and “Arjuna” come from Sanskrit.
मेरे दोस्त का नाम कमल है।My friend’s name is Kamal.
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