Modi Vowel Sign I

It replaces the consonant’s built-in a with i.

Most Modi consonant letters carry an unwritten a sound. 𑘱 is a dependent vowel sign: it attaches to a consonant and changes its vowel, rather than starting a syllable on its own.

Modi grew from the Nagari family of scripts, which includes Devanagari, and was adapted for continuous writing. It emerged as an administrative script in the 16th century, and the Marathas adopted it officially in the 17th; the earliest surviving document dates to the early 17th century. It was used mainly for Marathi, especially official letters and land records, and also for Hindi, Gujarati, Kannada, Konkani, Persian, Tamil and Telugu. In the 1950s Modi was formally discontinued, and Balbodh, the Marathi form of Devanagari, became standard for Marathi; Balbodh also served literary and sacred Marathi writing.

Why is it written after but shown before the consonant?

Type it after the consonant; the glyph can appear on its left.

The text sequence is consonant then 𑘱, but Modi shaping can place the sign to the consonant’s left; that visual position does not change the reading.

A box or detached mark points to a rendering problem, not a different reading. As of 2026, Microsoft’s font guidance explains that correct Modi display depends on both font and app support for shaping.