Hindi (हिन्दी)

Hindi is an Indo-Aryan language with about 487 million speakers. It is one of the official languages of India and is the main language used in the northern states of Rajasthan, Delhi, Haryana, Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Himachal Pradesh, Jharkhand and Bihar, and is spoken in much of north and central India alongside other languages such as Punjabi, Gujarati, Marathi or Bengali. In other parts of India, as well as in Nepal, Bangladesh and Pakistan, Hindi is understood. In Fiji people of Indian origin speak Hindi, and in some areas the Fijian people also speak it.

Hindi is closely related to Urdu, the main language of Pakistan, which is written with the Arabic script, and linguists consider Standard Hindi and Standard Urdu to be different formal registers both derived from the Khari Boli dialect, which is also known as Hindustani. Apart from the difference in writing systems, the other main difference between Hindi and Urdu is that Hindi contains more vocabulary from Sanskrit, while Urdu contains more vocabulary from Persian. At an informal spoken level there are few significant differences between Urdu and Hindi and they could be considered varieties a single language.

Hindi first started to be used in writing during the 4th century AD. It was originally written with the Brahmi script but since the 11th century AD it has been written with the Devanāgarī alphabet. The first printed book in Hindi was John Gilchrist's Grammar of the Hindoostanee Language which was published in 1796.

Devanāgarī alphabet for Hindi

Vowels (स्वर) and vowel diacritics

Hindi vowels and vowel diacritics

A recording of the Hindi vowels by मुहम्मद शकेब बेग (Mohammad Shakeb Baig) from भोपाल, भारत (Bhopal, India)

Consonants (व्यंजन)

Hindi consonants

A recording of the Hindi consonants by मुहम्मद शकेब बेग (Mohammad Shakeb Baig) from भोपाल, भारत (Bhopal, India)

Numerals

Hindi numerals and numbers from 0-10

More Hindi numbers

Downloads

Sample text in Hindi

सभी मनुष्यों को गौरव और अधिकारों के मामले में जन्मजात स्वतन्त्रता और समानता प्राप्त है। उन्हें बुद्धि और अन्तरात्मा की देन प्राप्त है और परस्पर उन्हें भाईचारे के भाव से बर्ताव करना चाहिए।

Transliteration
Sarbhī manuṣyōn̐ kō gaurav aur adhikārōn̐ kē māmalē mēn̐ janmajāt svatantratā aur samānatā prāpt hai. Unhēn̐ buddhi aur antarātmā kī dēn prāpt hai aur paraspar unēn̐ bhāīcārē kē bhāv sē bartāv karanā cāhiyē.

A recording of this text by Ganesh Deshmukh

A recording of this text by मुहम्मद शकेब बेग (Mohammad Shakeb Baig) from भोपाल, भारत (Bhopal, India)

Translation

All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.
(Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights)

Thanks to Arvind Iyengar for providing the above sample text.