7th May 2025, (Jamshoro) The Department of Sindhi, University of Sindh, Jamshoro, in collaboration with the Abdul Majid Bhurgri Institute of Language Engineering (AMBILE), Hyderabad, organized an orientation workshop focused on language technology and ongoing projects for the development of the Sindhi language.
Mr. Amar Fayaz Buriro, Director of AMBILE, delivered the orientation session, where he provided an in-depth overview of the institute’s ongoing digital and linguistic initiatives. These include cutting-edge projects in Natural Language Processing (NLP), computational linguistics, and AI-powered tools designed to preserve and promote the Sindhi language.
The session began with a welcome address by Prof. Dr. Noor Muhammad Shah, Chairman of the Sindhi Department, who warmly received the guest speaker and encouraged students to actively participate in collaborative projects, particularly the Sindhi WordNet, a flagship lexical database initiative aimed at expanding Sindhi’s presence in global linguistic technologies.
During his address, Mr. Amar Fayaz Buriro emphasized the critical need for collective academic efforts to safeguard Sindhi’s rich linguistic and cultural heritage in the era of artificial intelligence. He highlighted the indispensable role of human linguistic expertise, stating, “AI cannot function without structured linguistic data, our grammar, dialects, and indigenous knowledge systems remain its foundation.”
Challenging outdated narratives such as the discredited Aryan migration theory, Mr. Buriro stressed that Sindhi, as one of the world’s most ancient languages, has roots traceable to early Proto-Indo language traditions and deserves advanced scholarly and technological attention.
A key highlight of the session was the announcement that AMBILE will now offer its technological platform and mentorship for collaborative student engagement. Final-year students from the Sindhi Department will be invited to contribute to various AMBILE projects, gaining practical experience in data sorting, lexical compilation, and annotation for the Sindhi WordNet and other NLP resources.
Following the orientation, a list of interested students was compiled, and it was mutually agreed that a technical training session will be held at AMBILE in the last week of May 2025. This training will focus on equipping students with the necessary skills to contribute to the compilation, structuring, and enrichment of the Sindhi WordNet.
The workshop marks a significant step forward in bridging academic research and practical technological development in Sindhi linguistics, setting a new precedent for inter-institutional collaboration in language engineering.