Avagraha (ऽ, IPA:[ɐʋɐɡrɐɦɐ]) is a symbol used to indicate prodelision of an अ(a) in many Indian languages like Sanskrit as shown below. It is usually transliterated with an apostrophe in Roman script and, in case of Devanagari, as in the Sanskrit philosophical expression शिवोऽहम्Śivo'ham (Śivaḥ aham), which is a sandhi of (शिवः + अहम्) ‘I am Shiva’. The avagraha is also used for prolonging vowel sounds in some languages, for example Hindiमाँऽऽऽ! for ‘Mā̃ā̃ā̃ā̃!’ when calling to one's mother. This symbol is more frequently used in the Eastern Hindi and Bihari languages especially Bhojpuri language.
In the case of Hindi, the character is also sometimes used as a symbol to denote long or heavy syllables, in metrical poetry. For example, the syllables in the word छंदःchandaḥ ‘metre’ (in nominative) can be denoted as "ऽऽ", meaning two long syllables. (Cf. other notations in entry "Systems of scansion".)
