To safeguard the GSB Konkani dialect and bring it into the digital realm, the World Konkani Centre in Shaktinagar has launched the Konkani Text Corpus Project, aimed at preserving and promoting the language globally.
The initiative plans to compile 2,000 short articles, each around 100 words, written in GSB Konkani and accompanied by English translations. These texts—covering wedding customs, folk songs, rituals, and daily life—will be made available online for worldwide access.
Project coordinator B. Devadas Pai explained that centuries of migration and Portuguese rule led to a decline in linguistic documentation. As a result, the GSB community drifted from its original Konkani roots, a dialect closely linked to Prakrit.
To reverse this erosion, the Centre is gathering texts from individuals aged 40–60, ensuring authentic vocabulary and sentence patterns. Contributors—ranging from Konkani graduates to literature lovers—have undergone multiple rounds of training to generate sample write-ups.
The articles will be written in Devanagari script, recognized by the UGC, and tagged with descriptive headlines for easy browsing. The topics span cultural traditions like funeral rites, naming ceremonies, and lullabies, reflecting the language’s living heritage.
World Konkani Centre president Nandagopal Shenoy has taken a keen interest in the project. Once completed, the digital corpus will not only help preserve GSB Konkani but also analyze frequently used words and expressions, serving as a vital tool for linguistic research and education.