The Indian languages Machine Translation (MT) system developed by the consortium of 11 Indian institutions led by International Institute of Information Technology-Hyderabad (IIIT-H) is slated for national launch next month.

While the first edition of the system would provide automatic text translation in six Indian language pairs, the next edition would feature 12 more, Prof Rajiv Sangal, Director III-H here.

"Unlike Google and other sites which offer translation mainly from English to other international languages, our Sampark - the Machine Translation (MT) project focuses on Indian languages," Prof Sangal told PTI.

MT tools are upcoming areas of study in the field of computational linguistics. Machine translation is the application of computers to the translation of texts from one natural language into another, he said.

Replying to a question on the commercial applications of the system, the IIIT-H director said the Institute will look for tie-ups with IT companies after the product is launched next month.

"As an educational institute university we cannot look for commercial market. The Minister may involve in that. If IT giants like Google or Yahoo approach us for the system we will talk to them," Prof Samal hinted. .