ABSTRACTBy means of the ophthalmograph eye‐movement camera and six series of test cards, film graphs of eye movements in reading English, Urdu and Roman Urdu passages were recorded. The graphs were analysed, and comparisons were made of the times taken to read the passages silently and orally, as well as of aberrations of the normal reading pattern. Within the limitations of certain characteristics of the subjects, and of the extent to which it was found possible to control unwanted variables, an attempt was made comparatively to evaluate the scripts in terms of the time taken accurately to communicate a controlled amount of information. Factors were noted which appeared, at least initially, to reduce the efficiency of reading in English by readers whose mother tongue was Urd