This 'Karbi Lamtasam' a trilingual dictionary has been prepared as a supplement to the Dictionaries of the Karbi language as yet brought out since the British regime. Mention may be made that the North East of India is one of the richest and diverse cultural-linguistic regions of Asia. How- ever, there is enough scope for the development of these regional languages. The speakers of these languages themselves ignored about it and as a result the linguistic abundance of the region has not been sufficiently appreciated. The idea of compilation of a dictionary was given to me by the visitors from outside from time to time till I came to be part and parcel of the Karbi Cultural Society. I was very much impressed with their advices and suggestions for compiling and editing a dictionary and took a keen interest in collecting words from all sources possible. Though I took up the dictionary project, I didn't have any idea about compilation of a dictionary. After going through several types of dictionaries and the fundamentals of lexicography, I could realize that compilation of a dictionary is an arduous task, and there is a need for an authentic Karbi grammar. Taking the advantage of being the member of the Karbi Cultural Society, I could bring out a Karbi Grammar titled 'Sankur Karbi Lamkuru lapen Lamseng' in 1998 based on the dialectal variant of Eastern Karbi Anglong. I tried my level best to compose the basic principles of a grammar, but circumstances pre- vented me to standardize it in terms of linguistic approaches. The grammar therefore cannot be considered to be a purely functional, transformational or generative, but a titbit syntactic structural and just intended to cater to the need of the tribe a little bit. It is very much important to be noted that a practical and standard grammar for any speech com- munity has acquired urgency, as it is relevant for the survival of their languages.
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