Aspirated sounds in Urdu

In Urdu, aspirated sounds such as ‘bh’ (भ), ‘ph’ (फ) etc. are created by using a letter known as the ‘do chashmii he’ (Devanagari: दो चश्मी हे | IPA:  /d̪oː t͡ʃəʃmiː heː/ | Pronunciation: ) with other consonants such as the ones in the ‘be’ group.

ھ
  • do chashmi he
  • दो चश्मी हे

Above: The letter 'do chashmii he'

INTERESTING

The word “chashm”, in Urdu, means “eye”. This letter seems to have two “eyes” and hence the name - ‘do chashmii he’.

Above: How the ‘do chashmii he’ is written

In this unit, we’ll cover how the ‘do chashmii he’ joins with the letters of the ‘be’ group to create four unique aspirated letters. Later on, the ‘do chashmii he’ will appear repeatedly as we’ll see its usage with other consonants in the alphabet.

Most of the letters created with the ‘do chashmii he’ have no equivalent sounds in English and therefore, Hindi/Urdu words have been used to explain these sounds on the coming pages.