The Irula Alphabet

Irula ^[1] (ISO 639-3: iru) is a South Dravidian language spoken by the Irula tribal people of the Nilgiri Hills and surrounding forest areas of Tamil Nadu and Kerala, India.

The CIIL documents Irula as a South Dravidian I language — in the same subgroup as Tamil and Malayalam — making it more closely related to Tamil than to Kannada or Telugu.

Irula shares key phonological features with Tamil, including the distinctive retroflex approximant ḻ (as in Tamil ழ) that is absent from most other South Asian languages outside the Tamil branch.

Irula ^[1] is spoken in the Nilgiri Hills and surrounding areas of Tamil Nadu — including Nilgiris, Coimbatore, Erode, Dharmapuri, and Vellore districts — and in the Attappady area of Palakkad district in Kerala.

Irula communities are found in both the high-altitude Nilgiri plateau areas and the lower forested slopes and foothills. The Nilgiri region forms part of the Western Ghats UNESCO World Heritage Site.

The Endangered Languages Project ^[2] records Irula speaker communities as concentrated in this region at the Tamil Nadu-Kerala border area.

The Irula people ^[1] are renowned for their traditional expertise in catching venomous snakes, particularly cobras (Naja naja) and kraits (Bungarus caeruleus).

The Irula Snake Catchers' Industrial Co-operative Society, founded with support from Rom Whitaker in 1978, channels this traditional knowledge toward commercial venom extraction for anti-snake venom production — making Irula traditional knowledge directly valuable for public health in India.

The Irula language preserves rich vocabulary for snakes, snake behaviour, and forest ecology. The Endangered Languages Project ^[2] recognises that preserving Irula means preserving this traditional ecological knowledge.

Irula ^[1] is genetically related to Tamil and belongs to the same South Dravidian I subgroup. The CIIL classifies Irula alongside Tamil, Malayalam, Toda, and Kota — all closely related South Dravidian I languages.

Key shared features include the retroflex approximant ḻ (as in Tamil ழ), the two-rhotic distinction (r vs. ṟ), and shared core vocabulary.

However, Irula is not a dialect of Tamil — it is a distinct language shaped by the Irula community's forest-dwelling lifestyle and relative geographic separation from Tamil-speaking mainstream communities.

Irula ^[2] is classified as an endangered language. The CIIL ^[1] documents Irula as facing significant pressure from Tamil in Tamil Nadu and Malayalam in Kerala.

Most Irula communities are bilingual, speaking Tamil or Malayalam for interactions with non-Irula people. Education in the region is primarily conducted in Tamil or Malayalam, with limited formal instruction in Irula.

The community's traditional forest-based lifestyle is also under pressure from changing land use, which affects the cultural context in which the Irula language is most naturally used and transmitted.

The ḻ sound ^[1] (transcribed as ḻ or sometimes "zh") is a retroflex approximant found in Tamil, Malayalam, and Irula — but absent from most other South Asian languages. It is pronounced with the tongue tip curled back behind the alveolar ridge.

In Tamil, this sound is written as ழ and appears in words like Tamil (தமிழ் — the "zh" at the end is this sound) and pazham (பழம் — meaning "fruit").

The presence of this distinctive sound in Irula is strong evidence of its South Dravidian I membership alongside Tamil and Malayalam, and distinguishes Irula from Kannada and other Dravidian subgroups that lack this sound.

Irula ^[1] has no traditional indigenous writing system. Academic and CIIL documentation uses Latin-script transcription with IPA diacritics, including ḻ (for the retroflex approximant), ṟ (for the trill), and dot-below characters for retroflexes (ṭ, ḍ, ṇ, ḷ).

In practice, community materials are sometimes written in Tamil script, given the Tamil Nadu context and Irula's close genetic relationship to Tamil.

The CIIL uses standardised Latin transcription in its scientific documentation of Irula phonology and grammar.

The Irula ^[1] are a Scheduled Tribe community of Tamil Nadu and Kerala, traditionally inhabiting the forests and foothills of the Nilgiri region. The name "Irula" derives from the Tamil word irul (darkness/forest) — the "forest people".

The Irula are one of several indigenous communities of the Nilgiri region, living alongside the Toda, Kota, Badaga, and Kurumba communities — each with its own distinct language and culture.

The Endangered Languages Project ^[2] records the Irula as a Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Group (PVTG) with a distinctive culture, traditional ecological knowledge, and South Dravidian language.