Hi Parag, I reported similar bug (# 320) in May, 2008 where it is concluded that Emacs is not selecting the proper font for Indic script, for which I've applied the following temporary workaround for Devanagari script rendering to force the use of "Lohit Hindi" font. ,---- M-x my-setup-devanagari-rendering | (defun my-setup-devanagari-rendering() | "Setup devanagari rendering" | (interactive) | (set-fontset-font "fontset-default" | (cons (decode-char 'ucs ?\x0900) | (decode-char 'ucs ?\x097f)) | "Lohit Hindi-12")) `---- But that problem also went away in June or July, 2008, IIRC. So, that workaround is not needed anymore. Following is the link to the screenshot of the HELLO file rendered in "GNU Emacs 23.0.60.1 (x86_64-pc-linux-gnu, X toolkit, Xaw3d scroll bars) of 2008-11-16 on chateau": http://flickr.com/photos/wahjava/3043187881/ What I think, the problem at your end will be is lack of m17n support in Emacs. Following is the './configure' command line of my Emacs build: ,---- | ./configure '--prefix=/usr' '--host=x86_64-pc-linux-gnu' | '--mandir=/usr/share/man' '--infodir=/usr/share/info' '--datadir=/usr/share' | '--sysconfdir=/etc' '--localstatedir=/var/lib' '--program-suffix=-emacs-23' | '--infodir=/usr/share/info/emacs-23' '--with-sound' '--with-x' | '--with-toolkit-scroll-bars' '--with-gif' '--with-jpeg' '--with-png' | '--with-rsvg' '--with-tiff' '--with-xpm' '--with-freetype' '--with-xft' | '--with-libotf' '--with-m17n-flt' '--with-x-toolkit=athena' '--without-hesiod' | '--without-kerberos' '--without-kerberos5' '--with-gpm' '--with-dbus' | '--libdir=/usr/lib64' '--build=x86_64-pc-linux-gnu' | 'build_alias=x86_64-pc-linux-gnu' 'host_alias=x86_64-pc-linux-gnu' 'CFLAGS=-O2 | -pipe -mtune=nocona -march=nocona -ggdb' 'LDFLAGS=-Wl,--hash-style,both' `---- To figure out which font is used to render a particular character, move cursor to the character and do "C-u C-x =" as pointed to me by Kenichi Handa. HTH -- Ashish Shukla