WARNING: How I proofread Sanskrit Stotras and why you should always check the right Sanskrit pronunciation

Currently you can find a lot of Sanskrit Stotras in the Internet, but the very huge problem with all of them is that very often you can encounter the Stotras with a huge array of mistakes. 

I am compiling the very good variants of Stotras for my new blog Rubrique "Stotras" (all the Stotras uploaded will be for print on double-sided matte list in Devanagari and ITRANS - itrans for those, who don't know Devanagari).

The problem is when I have started to proofread Stotras I was outrageously shocked!

Usually, I am compiling the Stotras in the following way:

1) I am searching for Original Sanskrit Text, which you can "copy-paste". The "copy-paste" is needed, because I am converting "Devanagari to ITRANS" (in order not to scare non-Indian audience with just Devanagari letters).

See also: Resources for converting Devanagari (Sanskrit) to ITRANS, Unicode, Velthuis, Harvard-Kyoto (Devanagari converters) - http://vishnudut1926.blogspot.ru/2013/10/resources-for-converting-devanagari.html

2) Then I copy the Devanagari and ITRANS to WORD, delete <br /> tag with "CTRL+H" and use 2 or 3 columns formatting in order to fit the Stotras in the format "one double-sided matte list".

3) When the WORD-file (*.DOCX) is compiled I am saving it as *.PDF too.

4) Then, it especially refers to popular Stotras, I am searching for good youtube clip, so the audience could not only read the Stotras, but to hear it (youtube clips are especially crucial for those who want to learn the Stotra, because when you hear the Stotra in Music form, you will memorize It very in a very swift way)

If you use "copy-paste" conversion, it will look like this:

THE OUTRAGEOUSLY WRONG VARIANT OF "HARI-STOTRAM" FROM http://desipedia.desibantu.com/sri-hari-stotram

THE EXAMPLES OF ERRONEOUS STOTRAS FROM POPULAR SITES.

Let's look at the examples:

Here is the totally mistaken variant of "Hari Stotram" (the picture above), which you can find on some of Stotras sites.

For example, the variant from http://desipedia.desibantu.com/sri-hari-stotram

If you "copy-paste" the Sanskrit Version from the link above, the Verse 01 will sound like this:

jagajjalapalaM kachada kanda malaM,<br /> saraHandraphalaM mahAdaithyakalaM,<br /> nabho nIlakayaM duravaramayaM,<br /> supadmasaHyaM bajehaM bajehaM. 1

What's wrong with this variant from Desipedia? Nearly everything, because the Verse 01 is ruthlessly ruined by very wrong Sanskrit. 

What is "kachada kanda malaM"? How you can translate it from Sanskrit? In no way you can, because actually it is gibberish, created by illiterate transliterator of the Sanskrit.

Note, that this mistake is present in Sanskrit Text initially, that is it is not a mistake by Sanskrit-to-ITRANS converter.

Let's look at the RIGHT VARIANT in Devanagari:


जगज्जालपालं कनत्कण्ठमालं

शरज्जन्द्रभालं महादैत्यकालम् |

नभोनीलकायं दुरावारमायं

सुपद्मासहायं भजेऽहं भजेहम् ||

And in the RIGHT VARIANT ITRANS:

jagajjAlapAlaM kanatkaNThamAlaM <br /> <br /> sharajjandrabhAlaM mahAdaityakAlam |<br /> <br /> nabhonIlakAyaM durAvAramAyaM <br /> <br /> supadmAsahAyaM bhaje.ahaM bhajeham ||

Now let's look at the comparison table:

WRONG VARIANT	RIGHT VARIANT
jagajjalapalaM  kachada kanda malaM (this line is the huge error), saraHandraphalaM (the sounds must be “SH”, “JJ” and “BH”) mahAdaithyakalaM, (“TH” sound is ERROR) nabhonIlakayaM duravaramayaM, supadmasaHyaM bajehaM bajehaM. 1	jagajjAlapAlaM kanatkaNThamAlaM    sharajjandrabhAlaM mahAdaityakAlam |  nabhonIlakAyaM durAvAramAyaM   supadmAsahAyaM bhaje.ahaM bhajeham ||

As you can see, actually the very errouneos and not valid Stotra has been published on http://desipedia.desibantu.com/sri-hari-stotram and  a lot of similar sites, because people usually copy-paste the texts from one site to their sites and that' how the wrong variants spread like viruses. 

How we can escape the problem like these?

1) http://prapatti.com/

http://prapatti.com/ is very reliable site with Stotras and I am checking all the Variants with their Variants.

The only problem with http://prapatti.com/ is that you can't "copy-paste" the text from their PDF-files, that is you can't make your own compilation of Stotras in WORD.

2) Official Stotras Compendiums

Using official Stotras Ratnavali (Compendiums). Later I will publish a lot of very reliable Stotra Compendiums (link will appear here).

3) Using Google Transliterate Sanskrit and Devanagari to Roman converters for manual re-typing of Rare Stotras from Sanskrit Books (for those, who know Sanskrit)

If you know Sanskrit and would like to print the Stotra in beautiful style (in case the Stotra is uprintable, because, for example, the Stotra is situated in badly scanned old Sanskrit Book, like for example, this "Ashtavakra-Muni-Stotra"), then I advice you to use Google Transliterate Sanskrit and to spend some time typing the Stotra manually - http://www.google.com/inputtools/cloud/try/

That't how I am working on "SHREE HARI STOTRAM":

CLICK TO ENLARGE: Using Irfan-View (with "Always on top" switched on) and Google Transliterate for typing Stotras

As you can see on the picture above I have copied a part of original "Shree Hari Stotram" in Sanskrit  and Roman, made a graphic file (PNG, JPEG, etc.), then I turned on "Always on top" in Irfan-View (Options - Always on Top) and what I am doing currently is just re-typing the Stotra in Google Transliterate.

When you need the long "A" in Google, you should type double "a", that is "aa" and etc.

When you, for example, need to type "ण्ठ" like in रमाकण्ठहारं, you should type nTha (yes, with capital "T"). When you are dubious about typing aksharas, then just test as many letter combinations as you can (th, Th, TH, tH and etc.)

Also check up the pop-up menus with the suitable variants in Google Transliterate, they will help you a lot:

Pop-up helper menu in Google Transliterate and the Name of Bhagavan Shree Vishnu as the example

How to recognize badly transliterated or even not genuine Stotra. 

Badly transliterated or not genuine Stotras can be recognized by the following traits:

1) Not typical for Sanskrit words  (often, "TH" instead of "T": wrong "thvam" instead of the right "tvam" and etc.)

2) Stotras with suspicious origin, which you can't find nor in Puranas, neither in Tantras. For example, I have found "rare" Stotra, dedicated to Shreemati Lakshmi-Devi in the Internet.

Allegedly the Stotra was from "Brahma-Purana", but what made me suspicious is that Stotra-Dhyana proclaimed Shreemati Lakshmi-Devi to be "Three Eyed". I have checked "Brahma-Purana" and, of course, "Brahma-Purana" lacked such Stotra. So, the Stotra turned out to be false.

So, the overall rule for all such cases: use only classic Stotras ("Shree MahaLakshmi-Prapatti", "108 Names of Shreemati Lakshmi-Devi" and other classical Stotras).

And, of course, check http://prapatti.com/ for proper pronunciation.