Mygurudu

Mygurudu is a Malayalam-based secret language developed in Northern Kerala during the Malabar Rebellion of 1921.^[1]^[2] Prisoners used this coded language to pass messages without getting leaked.

Concepts[edit]

The fundamental idea behind Mygurudu involves the swapping of Malayalam alphabets. For example, Mygurudu uses ‘Ra’ instead of ‘Cha’, and ‘Pa’ instead of ‘Na’.

Current State[edit]

Mygurudu had about 400 speakers before 2020, however, the number of speakers has reached 900, and 2,500+ people are learning right now. This is mostly due to online platforms increasing accessibility to language learning resources. [1] The Speech Science Research Forum of the Department of Linguistics of Kerala University has digitized and documented the structure of Mygurudu and other dying languages.^[2]

The scheme[edit]

The following tables give the transposition scheme used in the Mygurudu code.

Vowels[edit]

Clear text	അ	ആ	ഇ	ഈ	ഉ	ഊ	ഋ	എ	ഏ	ഐ	ഒ	ഓ	ഔ	അം	അഃ
Cipher text	സ	സാ	സി	സീ	സു	സൂ	സൃ	സെ	സേ	സൈ	സൊ	സോ	സൗ	സം	സ:

Consonants[edit]

Clear text	ക	ങ	ച	വ	ണ്ട	പ	റ	ഞ	ങ്ക	മ്പ	ന്ത	ബ
Cipher text	മ	യ	ര	ട	ഷ	ന	ണ	ള	റ്റ	ഞ്ച	ഹ	ജ

Mnemonic[edit]

The users had developed a mnemonic to learn and remember this language. The mnemonic was very similar to Sanskrit slokas.

കമ ങയ ചര വട ണ്ടഷ
പന റണ ഞള ങ്കറ്റ മ്പഞ്ച
ന്തഹ ബജ

Examples[edit]

Clear text	എന്താ പേര്	എവിടാ വീട്	ഒരു ചായ വേണം	കടി വേണോ	വേണ്ട
Cipher text	സെഹാ നേച്ച്	സെടീവാ ടീവ്	സൊചു രാങ ടേറം	മവി ടേറോ	ടേഷ

References[edit]

^ Shafeeq, Alingal (2017-04-27). "Mygurudu! The jail lingo is vocal again". Express News Service, The New Indian Express. Retrieved 2017-11-17.
^ ^a ^b "Project to digitise dying languages embarked". PTI, The Economic Times. 2013-12-06. Retrieved 2017-11-17.

[NIE_2017_article-1] Shafeeq, Alingal (2017-04-27). "Mygurudu! The jail lingo is vocal again". Express News Service, The New Indian Express. Retrieved 2017-11-17.

[ET_2013_article-2] "Project to digitise dying languages embarked". PTI, The Economic Times. 2013-12-06. Retrieved 2017-11-17.

[1]

[2]