About Me

I am a linguist in mind and a musician at heart. I grew up in Bhatpara, a suburb on the outskirts of Kolkata, in a family which produced some of the greatest torchbearers of oriental learning for over three centuries. I learnt Sitar from an early age, formally trained under several professional musicians, and it has now become my lifelong companion.

After completing my Bachelor's (English) and Master's (Linguistics) degrees and a brief stint in French language and literature, I began research in Computational Linguistics in Sanskrit under Prof. Malhar Kulkarni at IIT Bombay.

Education

• ICSE (10): St. Luke's Day School • 2013

• ISC (10+2): St. Luke's Day School • 2015

• BA (English): Rabindra Bharati University • 2018

• MA (Linguistics): University of Calcutta • 2020

• PhD (Linguistics): Cell for Indian Science and Technology in Sanskrit, Dept. of HSS, IIT Bombay • 2022 - pursuing

Qualifications

• National Eligibility Test (UGC-NET) in Linguistics (Assistant Professor) • July, 2023
• Graduate Aptitude Test in Engineering (GATE) in Linguistics • March, 2021
• Diplôme d’études en langue française B2 (DELF) • France Éducation International [May, 2022]
• Test de Connaissance du Français (TCF) • France Éducation International [March, 2021]
• International English Language Testing System (IELTS) • Overall Band Score: 8.0 (CEFR C1) [December, 2023]

Competencies

• Diploma in French Language • Rabindra Bharati University

• French (B1 - B2) • Alliance Française du Bengale

• Certificate Course (1 Year) in German • School of Languages and Linguistics, Jadavpur University

• Pre-MA (1 Year) in French • Dept. of French, University of Calcutta

• Junior Certificate (1 Year) in Ancient Greek • School of Languages, Ramakrishna Mission Institute of Culture

• Certificate Course (6 Months) in Sanskrit titled “Pravesha” • Samskrita Bharati

• Open Elective Course (6 months) titled “Samsādhanī – Praveśikā: Learning Sanskrit Using Computational Tools” • Dept. of Sanskrit Studies, University of Hyderabad

• Advanced certificate Course (6 Months) in Sanskrit titled “Parichaya” • Samskrita Bharati

• Certificate Course (1 Year) in Mandarin Chinese • IIT Bombay

• Coursera Course titled Miracles of Human Language: An Introduction to Linguistics • Leiden University and Meertens instituut (KNAW). [Jul 2023]

Seminars / Workshops / Summer Schools

• 'Language, Culture and Cognition' • A short-term training programme sponsored by AICTE, IIT Madras [2021]
• Summer School on Language Documentation • Scheme for Protection and Preservation of Endangered Languages (SPPEL), Central Institute of Indian Languages (CIIL) [2022]
• Summer School in English Corpus Linguistics (link) • Survey of English Usage, Department of English Language and Literature, University College of London [2022]
• Workshop on “Turning Conference Article into a Journal Paper” by Prof. Alejandro Frery • GISE HUB, IIT Bombay [2022]
• Summer School of Computational Linguistics • Linguistic Data Consortium for Indian Languages (LDC-IL), Central Institute of Indian Languages (CIIL) [2023]

Paper Presentations

• “A Study of Some Phonological Processes and Laws Acting in the Indo-Iranian Branch”
  Master’s Thesis, Dept. of Linguistics, University of Calcutta (2020)
  



• “A Linguistic Description of the Veda Vikr̥ti Pāṭhas for Computational Generation”
  Paper presented at the 2nd Dr. Madhukar Anant Mehendale Endowment Seminar, Deccan College Post-Graduate and Research Institute, Pune (2022)



• “A Rule-based Sandhi Splitter for Bengali”
  Presented at the 44th International Conference of the Linguistic Society of India (ICOLSI-44) ), organised by the Linguistic Society of India, hosted by Centurion University of Technology and Management (2022)




• “The Ṛgveda: A Corpus Phonological Analysis”
  Presented at the 45th International Conference of the Linguistic Society of India (ICOLSI-45), organised by the Linguistic Society of India, hosted by Aligarh Muslim University (2023)



• Delivered a talk titled Linguistics and Grammar: The Case of Rigveda at Computation for Indian Language Technology Lab (C-FILT), IIT Bombay (2024)



• “Syllabification according to the R̥gvedaprātiśākhya”
  Presented at the The LINGUINDIC Conference: Modern Linguistics and Ancient India, held at Wolfson College, University of Oxford (2025)




• “The Clusters in the R̥gveda: Sonority and Phonotactics”
  Presented at the 19th World Sanskrit Conference, Nepal, hostel by Nepal Sanskrit University (2025)
  Also presented briefly in parts at the Acharye Limaye Smruticharchasatra, Tilak Maharashtra Vidyapeeth (2025)

Linguistic Proficiency

• Bengali (Native)
• Hindi (Fluent)
• English (Fluent)
• Chinese (Basic)
• French (Proficient)
• German (Basic)
• Sanskrit (Basic)
• Old Persian and Avestan (Reading)

Research Interests

• Historical Linguistics
• Indo-Aryan Linguistics
• Computational Linguistics and NLP
• Sanskrit
• Indo-European Linguistics
• Descriptive and General Linguistics

Current Research

• I am currently trying to figure out the relationship of pitch accent in Vedic Sanskrit (w.r.t Ṛgveda at present) with the grammatical categories in isolation as well as in a syntactic construction.
• I am currently trying to write a guide to sitar learning with a result-oriented approach in mind, and also to develop a broad transcription/annotation for sitar/instrumental/Hindustani classical Music.
• I alongwith another Priyanka Salekar have started working on an English translation of Padmanābhadatta's Supadma Vyākaraṇa (sample), a sūtra style neo-grammatical text of the 14th century, written in Mithila.
• Re-publishing my great-grandather Pandit Kamalakṛṣṇa Smṛtitīrtha's book "Bhaṭṭapallīvāśiṣṭhavaṃśaparicaya" (ভট্টপল্লীবাশিষ্ঠবংশপরিচয়), on our genealogy and the oriental scholarship of Bhatpara/ Bhaṭṭapallī, whose work is almost done. I have also created a basic website based on the book, which will be updated with the latest documents and links.
• I had created some videos on Old Persian texts which are available on the YouTube channel Indo-Iranian Linguistics.
• Some papers related to my earlier works are on the verge of publication.
• Online article written on Bengali Language and Technology.

Reading Materials

• My Linguistics Reading List
• Computational Linguistics Books and Resources
• LaTeX for Linguistics (I use LaTeX for all kinds of documents).

Memberships

• Life Member of the Linguistic Society of India
• Life Member of the Dravidian Linguistic Association of India

My Music

• Indian Classical Instrumentalist (Sitar), received guidance from my mother (Smt. Shanta Bhattacharyya), Pt. Rabi Chakraborty, Sri Samanwaya Sarkar, Pt. Debaprasad Chakraborty and Pt. Partha Chatterjee (in chronological order). I am also being mentored by Pt. Purbayan Chatterjee.
• Ex-Scholar at ITC Sangeet Research Academy (2016-2022)
• 1st Prize in Doverlane Music Competition (2012)
• 1st Prize in the music competition organised by "Chetla Murari Smriti Sangeet Sammilani" (2013)
• The Telegraph School Awards for Excellence for Outstanding Talent in Music
• Recipient of "Scholarships to Young Artists in Different Cultural Fields" from the Ministry of Culture, Govt. of India (2018)
• Played for films/documentaries/music videos A Journey on the Tabla, The Closed Door, Banglar Mukh Ami Dekhiyachi - The Film, Bhairavi Station, Bhairavi Sonata, Dhono Dhanyo Pushpo Bhora, etc.
• Hostel Cultural Secretary for Hostel 18, IIT Bombay (2022-23)
• Post-Graduate Classical and Folk Arts Convener (Roots Club) of PG Cult (Post-Graduate Cultural Council), IIT Bombay (2023-24).
• Cultural Councillor of Hostel 13, IIT Bombay (2024-25)
• Joint Overall Coordinator of Saathi, IIT Bombay's LGBTQ+ Resource Group (2025-26)
• In October 2023, I along with some friends started a "Classical Music Group" (link to join our WhatsApp Group) consisting of musicians and connoisseurs in IIT Bombay.
• I have a YouTube channel by my own name (which has more than 2.2k subscribers now), where I have been uploading Indian Classical Music since 2013.

     My Videos

• A recording from an online concert where I played Raag Multani