India Languages

Background
The Constitution of India specifies the official language of the Union is Hindi, written in Devanagari script, and English. Originally, English was to be an official language only until 1962. The 1963 Official Languages Act allows English to continue as an official language until changed by legislation. Each state, union territory, and autonomous region has the right to designate official languages for that area.

Most of the languages spoken in India are part of either the Indo-Aryan or Dravidian language families. Indo-Aryan languages are found in the north, and Dravidian in the south. The 2001 census of India identified 122 major languages spoken in the country. The Constitution lists 22 scheduled languages, which are recognized by the government. There are also six classical languages, which have strong literary traditions and a large body of written literature.

Languages
Hindi, Bengali, Marathi, Telugu, Tamil, Gujarati, Urdu, Kannada are the first language of over 80% of the population. Many of the people are multilingual, and according to the 2011 census nearly 130 million persons, or 10.67% per cent, speak English as a first, second, or third language.

Scheduled Languages
This table lists the 22 scheduled languages and the states, union territories, or regions where they are spoken.

Classical Languages
Classical languages are determined by age (1500-2000 years), an existing body of texts considered to be a "valuable heritage', an original literary tradition, and distinct from the modern version. The six classical languages of India, and the year they were declared to be classical, are: • 2

Languages by State and Union Territory
This table lists each State or Union Territory and its official language.

Hindi
• 2

Bengali
• 2

Marathi
• 2

Telugu
• 2

Tamil
• 2

Gujarati
• 2

Urdu
• 2

Kannada
• 2