Bilaspuri New Testament — Bilaspuri (Kahluri) New Testament (India)
Overview
बिलासपुरी नौआं नियम ("Bilaspuri New Testament") is the complete New Testament (27 books) in the Bilaspuri language of Bilaspur District, Himachal Pradesh, India, published by The Love Fellowship in 2021 under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 (CC-BY-SA-4.0) license and available via YouVersion/Bible.com (ID 2768; abbreviation: KFSNT). Bilaspuri (also called Kahluri or Bilaspuri-Kahluri) is a Western Pahari language of the Himalayan foothills zone of Himachal Pradesh — one of the many small Indo-Aryan languages of the Pahari dialect continuum that extends from Jammu to Nepal.
Language and People
Bilaspuri/Kahluri is an Indo-European language: Indo-European → Indo-Iranian → Indo-Aryan → Pahari → Western Pahari branch. The Western Pahari languages of Himachal Pradesh form a dense cluster of related but distinct varieties spoken in adjacent valleys — Bilaspuri/Kahluri is centered in Bilaspur District along the Sutlej River, in the valley flooded by the Bhakra Dam reservoir (Gobind Sagar Lake).
The Bilaspuri community inhabits:
- Bilaspur District, Himachal Pradesh, India — along the Sutlej River and Gobind Sagar Lake
Estimated speakers: approximately 150,000–200,000.
Cultural Context
Bilaspur District is historically notable as the former Kahlur princely state, which was the first Indian princely state to join independent India (1948). The district was significantly transformed by the construction of the Bhakra Dam (completed 1963), which flooded much of the original valley and displaced many communities. The Love Fellowship's 2021 NT under CC-BY-SA-4.0 open-license terms makes the Bilaspuri scripture freely reproducible and distributable.
Publishing and Organizations
Published by The Love Fellowship under CC-BY-SA-4.0 open license. Android app maintained by IPS Apps.