THOMAS STEPHENS KONKNNI KENDR B.B. Borkar Road, Alto Porvorim, GOA - 403521 ( (0832) 2415857, 2415864 E-mail:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Website:www.tskk.org October 5, 2005
Sir, Kindly give publicity to the following press release. I have sent the photograph of the function as an attachment. Thanking you, Yours truly, Dr. Pratap Naik, S.J. Director SECOND EDITION OF TSKK KONKANI ORTHOGRAPHY IN ROMAN SCRIPT The first edition of "TSKK Romi Lipi" a booklet of 52 pages which deals with the modified Roman orthography of Thomas Stephens Konknni Kendr (TSKK) to write Konkani in Roman script, was released by the veteran Konkani singer Mr. Ullas Buyanv on 15th August at Grace Church Hall, Margão. TSKK printed 750 copies. Within a month all copies were sold out. TSKK improved and edited the text and now published the second edition of the book on 2 October, Gandhi Jayanti Day. Since there is a demand for this booklet 1000 copies have been printed. The book is written by Dr. Pratap Naik, S.J and it is published by TSKK, Alto Porvorim. TSKK took the initiative to modify the existing Roman orthography to suit the Konkani speech sounds, the requirements of e-mail and other computer applications. TSKK has evolved an orthography for Konkani which is scientific and at the same time user friendly. TSKK orthography makes use of a linear typing system without diacritics, making use of only the standard computer keyboard. It has used 24 alphabets of the Roman alphabet and added only two phonetic symbols available on the keyboard. Except three major and one minor speech sound all other speech sounds of Konkani are correctly represented in TSKK orthography. At present among all the orthographies used to write Konkani in any script, TSKK Orthography is the closest to the pronunciation. It has 96% accuracy. 100% accuracy could not be attained because TSKK orthography makes use of physically visible computer keyboard and avoids diacritical marks. One has to read what is written just like Sanskrit orthography. Therefore it is ideal and best suited to write Konkani. This booklet contains a few Konkani texts in TSKK Roman Orthography, Devanagari and Kannada scripts. TSKK hopes that these texts will help Konkanis, and others to read and write Konkani in Roman script. The booklet is available at TSKK office, Zito Almeida, Margao, St. Paul's Bookshop, Panaji, Varsha Bookstall, Panaji and at Bom Jesus Bookstall, Old Goa.
