Origin

The character 粒 combines a rice plant radical on the left, which signals this character relates to grain or small food particles, with the component 立 on the right that serves as a sound hint suggesting how the character should be pronounced. Together these elements create a character meaning individual grains of rice or other tiny particles. The grain radical makes sense because a 粒 is precisely one small unit of something larger, just as individual grains of rice are countable units of the crop. This is why 粒 works as a counter word for small round objects and particles in Japanese.