Padyam: Chandas and Poetic Reading
Padyam: chandas and poetic reading
Padyam is the poetry domain: prescribed verses, their anvaya and bhāvārtha, plus chandas and prosody. The paper commonly asks for the chandas name, gaṇa division, pāda scheme, yati, prāsa/anupāsa, and a simple alaṃkāra identification.
Core rules
- Gaṇa = three syllables. Laghu (⏑) = short vowel not followed by conjunct, anusvāra or visarga. Guru (−) = long vowel, anusvāra, visarga, or vowel before conjunct.
- Count syllables per pāda, not letters. Samavṛtta has all pādas alike.
- Common counts: anuṣṭubh 8; indravajrā/upendravajrā 11; vasantatilakā 14; mālinī 15; mandākrāntā 17; śārdūlavikrīḍita 19.
- Indravajrā begins ta-ta-ja-ga-ga; upendravajrā begins ja-ta-ja-ga-ga.
- Alaṃkāra: upamā (like), rūpaka (metaphor), anuprāsa (sound repetition), yamaka (repeated syllable group).
Worked example
विद्या ददाति विनयं। Scan: vi ⏑, dyā −, da ⏑, da ⏑, ti ⏑, vi ⏑, na ⏑, yaṃ −. Eight syllables in the pāda; the full verse has four such pādas (8×4), so it is anuṣṭubh. Note that dyā is guru because ā is long, and yaṃ is guru because of anusvāra. If you counted “dyā” as two units, the count would be wrong.
Traps
Do not split a conjunct like kṣa into k-ṣa for syllable count; it is one syllable onset. Visarga and anusvāra make the preceding vowel guru. Confusing indravajrā with upendravajrā costs the chandas mark; check the first gaṇa. Do not call every comparison upamā-look for vācaka words like iva, yathā, sadṛśa.