Script, Orthography and Grammar
What the exam tests
This domain checks how confidently you map sounds to Manipuri writing, distinguish the two scripts used in Assam, and apply core Meiteilon grammar rather than English word order.
Script systems
- Meitei Mayek has 18 major letters, including Kok, Sam, Lai, Mit, Pa, Na, Chil, Til, Khou, Ngou, Thou, Wai, Yang, Huk, Un, I, Pham and Atiya. Final consonants are written with lonsum signs; vowels attach as dependent signs.
- Bengali script is still widely used for Manipuri in Assam. Learn the conventional correspondences, but remember that the script does not consistently mark lexical tone.
Orthography
- Keep one script within a word; mixing Meitei Mayek and Bengali forms is a common error.
- Distinguish vowel signs from independent vowels, and do not omit final consonants.
- Tone is lexically distinctive in Manipuri, so minimal pairs may look alike in writing; exam questions often test meaning from context.
Grammar core
- Basic order is Subject–Object–Verb.
- Manipuri is agglutinative: suffixes and postpositions carry case, number and discourse meaning.
- There is no grammatical gender; classifiers and honorific levels matter more than masculine/feminine agreement.
Worked example
Ei chak chai means “I eat rice.” Ei is the first-person subject, chak is the object, and chai is the verb. The reasoning is: identify the verb last, then the object before it, then the subject. Do not translate word by word into English order; build the Manipuri clause in SOV order.
Traps
Treating Bengali letters as exact phonetic equivalents; forgetting lonsum; inserting English articles; and ignoring honorific or classifier choices that change the naturalness of a sentence.