For many Indians, if not most, the noun Panini (plural in Italian, singular in English) is only an yummy grilled sandwich stuffed with mozzarella, prosciutto, and pesto, not a certain revered scholar who conceived and created the grammar which forms the soul of Sanskrit and guides sincere seekers across disciplines to this day. For them, even the noticeable difference in pronunciation is hardly a cue, for what they see is what they fetch over-the-counter in inviting eateries across US, Europe, and Asia (not what they will never read; neither online on their laptops, nor off-line in the dusty corners of termite-infested libraries)
Ironically, I have met a handful of Italians who fondly associate the noun with the great grammarian who dexterously mapped the astounding territory of the human tongue, taking inspiration from founding scholars like Āpiśali, Kāśyapa, Gārgya, Gālava, Cākravarmaṇa, Bhāradvāja, Śākaṭāyana, Śākalya, Senaka, and Sphoṭāyana.
At home, amid the politically motivated religious jingoism, most of Panini’s life work does not get the recognition it deserves, including his eight chapter-long ‘Turing Machine’ magnum opus Ashtadhyayi with 4000 intricate and interconnected sutras.
Save for the discussion in stringently fortified scholarly and academic circles, Panini remains virtually unknown to most modern-day inhabitants of India, except if or when they
come across the glowing tributes of yesteryear scholars like the great Stanford linguist and Chomksy’s partner Paul Kiparsky,or casually sift through Vikram Chandra’s Geek Sublime (probably mistaking him for Vikram Seth of ‘A Suitable Boy’ fame),or learn in the course of their entrepreneurial and employment careers (from Western experts) why and how Panini can help AI move from convenient approximations towards reliable frameworks in addressing the sticky challenges of natural language processing, computational efficiency, logical reasoning, pattern recognition, exception-handling and a lot more.This is a bigger tragedy than the scarceness of Panini's ‘part history part legend’ life story, including his sudden death while working on the last sutra of Ashtadhyayi, when he fell prey to a lion in the forest wilderness.
PS: I find Panini sandwiches irresistible, and I found ‘A Suitable Boy’ an engaging read.