RE: RE: Bengali script - where is "khanda ta"?

From: Apurva Joshi (
Date: Tue May 21 2002 - 21:09:20 EDT

Below a sample question and related answer for the FAQ. Feel free to
use/discard it.

Q. I don't see the Khanda Ta encoded in the Bengali block? It has a
distinct shape.

Ans. Bengali does not have distinct half forms for consonants like
Devanagari and Gujarati do. Hence for all practical purposes, the halant
forms are also considered as half forms. Conjuncts that are used by the
Bengali language typically have ligatures to display them as. It is only
in the case of words that are not native to Bengali and require the
display of conjuncts that don't have ligatures; that these halant forms
are used. The khanda Ta is not a consonant (or distinct character) by
itself, but the halant form of a consonant. It is a special case
graphically because it is not displayed as Ta Halant (as other
consonants in Bengali), but has a distinct shape. Such alternate forms
can be displayed using an OpenType font, that contains glyphs for such
forms. Below are sample sequences to display the conjunct created using
Ta Halant Ta in different ways. They assume that the font contains a
glyph for: (i) the Khanda Ta, as well as (ii). a glyph for the ligature
of this conjunct.

1. Ta Halant Ta -> Ligature for taTa
2. Ta Halant ZWJ Ta -> KhandaTa Ta
3. Ta Halant ZWNJ Ta -> Ta Halant Ta

Couple images attached.
Thanks, -apurva

-----Original Message-----
From: Rick McGowan []
Sent: Tuesday, May 21, 2002 12:37 PM
Subject: Re: RE: Bengali script - where is "khanda ta"?

Would anyone care to summarize the problem or question here, and write
a paragraph for the Indic FAQ?

Does anyone have a picture of it?




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