At least 20 language and core experts from the engineering field from across Gujarat — divided into two panels of ten members each — are putting in their expertise in dialects and science to create this glossary in English, Gujarati and Hindi.

An aspect which is kept in mind by these experts is different connotations a word carries in different branches. “For instance, the term ‘point’ in civil engineering means place while the same in maths is bindu while in electrical it stands for node. Attention is being paid to understand which domain the word has come from, and its meaning in that domain. Also, in some cases technical words are not necessarily translating into Gujarati which makes them more difficult to remember.

From our experience we have decided not to touch the technical jargon like programming, python while computer can be sanganak a sanskrit and hindi word used for computer which we are also using for Gujarati,” Prof Ajay Parikh, core computer expert from Gujarat University, one of the twenty experts, said.

“The project was handed over to GTU (Gujarat Technological University) by the Commission for Scientific and Technical Terminology (CSTT). Almost 70 per cent work is over as more than 32,000 words have been reviewed by the panel of experts,” said Chirag Vibhakar, Principal Gujarat Power Engineering and Research Institute (GPERI), Mehsana. He is heading one of the two panels.

The Commission for Scientific and Technical Terminology (CSTT) – under the Ministry of Education – has been set up with an objective to evolve and define scientific and technical terms in Hindi and all Indian languages; publish glossaries, definitional dictionaries and encyclopedias. It has been tasked to ensure that the evolved terms and their definitions are understood by the students, teachers, scholars, scientists, and officers.

So far, five review meetings have been conducted with a target of completing the glossary by July. Hindi translations have already been done by other experts which are being used as reference by Gujarati and Sanskrit experts. Following an initial translation work during the pandemic, a panel of branch wise or domain wise experts was constituted including the four-mechanical, civil, electrical and electronics and communication, and 50,000 words are being reviewed.

“We are helping mainstream vernacular students. While Gujarati explanations of technical words are being used there are cases where these are kept as it is. About 50,000 Gujarati terminology will be reviewed through frequent back-to-back review meetings. The implementation of National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 and All India Council of Technical Education (AICTE’s) policy of preparing question papers in regional languages ​​including English will also be greatly accelerated by this comprehensive glossary,” Prof Rajul Gajjar, Vice Chancellor of GTU Ahmedabad. , told this paper.

The fifth review meeting, which spanned five days, concluded on May 17 for the Gujarati edition of the pre-published Comprehensive Engineering Glossary (English-Hindi) at the GTU campus. Experts in engineering, Gujarati and Sanskrit languages ​​participated in this meeting and reviewed around 8,000 Gujarati words.