The Iranian Academy of Persian language and literature finally
published it proposal on Persian orthography in Esfand 1378 (March
2000). After six years of discussion and research, and carrying out a public
opinion poll even though the proposed orthography has a more moderate
style than itspreviously drafted version and the existing letter styles in use,
it is still vague and inconsistent and has deficiencies and mistakes which
totally amount to sixty instances. The mistakes of the published proposal, in
the chapter "the Characteristics of Persian Orthography", mostly concern
the descriptions which have been inadequately expressed. The most
important mistake in the chapter titled" Orthography Signs" is the order of
the letters of Persian alphabet where the Hamzeh (the Arabic "consonant
alef) precedes alef and the letter "a". The mistakes of the chapter titled
"the Spelling of Some Words, Suffixes and Prefixes" include the
inconsistency of rules and their ambiguity in describing all similar instances
of application. The mistakes in the chapter about subject pronouns (in the
Persian language these are the suffixes-m, -y, -yam (or-yim), -yad and -nad
which are attached to the verb) concern the mixing of the rules of the verb
"ast" (present tense of the verb to be ") with the otherfive subject pronouns
attached to the verb. The mistakes in the two chapters "Possessive
Pronouns and Object Pronouns" and "The Indefinite Article, Infinitive
Article and Relative Article" (all of which is represented by the suffix" -ya "
in the Persian language) consist of deficiencies in applying grammatical
rules. The mistakes in the chapter titled "the Usage of Hamzeh (the Arabic
"consonant alef) mostly include inconsistencies in presenting the rules,
expressing numerous rules and exceeding the standards of the prevailing
style of Persian orthography. The mistakes of the chapter titled "the
Terminology, Syntax and Expressions Derived from the Arabic Language"
mostly consist of incomplete rules. The chapter "Compound Words" is the
chapter in which the Academy has made the greatest number of
orthographic mistakes. The most important mistake is that the scientific
logic of orthography and the Persian language have not been observed and
this has resulted in much in consistency. Besides the instances mentioned
above there are many other disputable points in Persian orthography which
have not been made clear in this orthography proposal on Persian.