PATNA: A faculty member of Michigan University (US), Anshuman Pandey, has finally completed his stupendous project of encoding the `Tirhuta’ script (original Maithili script) in the Universal Character Set. Pandey’s work will assist in the preservation of ‘Tirhuta’ script, which is nearly obsolete in India, even amongst Maithili speaking people.
Traditional ‘Tirhuta’ script is the traditional writing with regard to the Maithili language, which is spoken in major parts of Bihar and in the Narayani and Janakpur zones of Nepal. The script is also known as `Tirhuta’, which refers to Mithila or Tirhut as these regions of India and Nepal are historically known.
To preserve the traditional script of Maithili, Pandey has been pursuing this project for the last five of years. This project was made possible, although only partly, by a grant from the United States National Endowment for the Humanities which funded the Universal Scripts Project. In course of the ongoing research, he has already consulted several Maithili scholars, besides books and journals from Nepal Research Centre at Kathmandu.