This typeface answers a key question: What if Indian typography refused to play 'catch-up' with the west?

"Kshitij began to investigate this overlooked gap in Indic typography surrounding digital numerals and modular type systems during his undergraduate degree, which led him to create 12:40, a monolinear typeface built on a grid that unites Latin, Devanagari and Urdu without erasing their individuality. Inspired by "old technologies and segmented displays" like those on the early digital clocks of his childhood, Kshitij turned the idea of constraint into a space for experimentation and a new set of letterforms."

""I also drew inspiration from blogs like ManVsType, designers like Shiva at November, Indian Type Foundry, Mota Italic and Universal Thirst for the project, all of them proving that Indic type design could be as rigorous and experimental as anything coming out of the West," he shares. "I've always wanted to treat the everyday, lived typography of India, with the same seriousness and respect as Swiss posters or western modernism.""

Kshitij investigated a gap in Indic typography around digital numerals and modular type systems and created 12:40, a monolinear grid-based typeface that unites Latin, Devanagari and Urdu while preserving distinct script traits. The design takes inspiration from old segmented displays and early digital clocks, converting constraint into experimental letterforms and numerals. Influences from blogs and Indian foundries reinforced the potential for rigorous, experimental Indic type design. The development balanced the strict clarity of modernist grids with Devanagari’s energetic, street-facing forms, deliberately altering the śirorekhā and designing alternate glyphs to retain a readable overall texture. The goal prioritized choosing when and why to apply specific influences rather than elevating any single script or system.

Read at Itsnicethat