India's Linguistic Landscape: From constitutional safeguards to endangered languages

Indian Express

a day ago

UPSC Issue at a Glance is an initiative by UPSC Essentials aimed at streamlining your preparation for the prelims and mains examinations by focusing on current issues making headlines. Every Thursday, cover a new topic in a lucid way. This week we take you through India's Linguistic Landscape. Let's get started.
If you missed the previous UPSC Issue at a Glance | From Caste to its Census: What you must know for UPSC Exam from the Indian Express, read it here.
India's multilingual landscape is the epitome of the country's diversity and heritage, having evolved into its present form after millennia of migrations and cultural mixing. It has been, in many ways, our greatest source of strength and yet, at times, the cause behind some bitter political skirmishes. In this context, let us look at India's linguistic landscape through constitutional mandate, classical languages and the challenge of extinction faced by various languages.
(Relevance: UPSC Syllabus-General Studies-I, II: Indian culture will cover the salient aspects of Art Forms, literature and Architecture from ancient to modern times. Indian Constitution, Government policies and intervention.
UPSC has previously asked questions on language-related provisions of the Constitution of India, classical languages and other associated aspects. Thus, it becomes essential to cover the topic of India's languages comprehensively, not only for the prelims but also for the mains.)
Kos-kos par badle paani, chaar kos par baani (The water changes every mile, the speech every fourth.)
This age-old saying beautifully captures the essence of India's unmatched linguistic richness, the linguistic diversity that has long been a defining strength of Indian democracy. Notably, even in the face of a partition based on religious grounds, the long discussions and deliberations for safeguarding the pluralistic features of Indian society were seen in the Constituent Assembly debates.
In contrast to the Western model of a nation-state, where the dominant language becomes the norm, federal principles were established in the Constitution of India to encourage and protect the multilingual-multicultural ethos. India served as a model for other linguistically diverse states, encouraging them to embrace cultural-linguistic diversity. In this context, let's understand various provisions of the Constitution of India related to languages.
📍Eighth Schedule
The Eighth Schedule to the Constitution of India lists the languages officially recognised by the Government of India. As of May 2025, 22 languages have been classified under the Eighth Schedule. Initially, however, the Schedule included 14 languages: Assamese, Bengali, Gujarati, Hindi, Kannada, Kashmiri, Malayalam, Marathi, Oriya (renamed to Odia in 2011), Punjabi, Sanskrit, Tamil, Telugu, and Urdu.
These 14 languages were selected from among the hundreds identified by George A Grierson in his Linguistic Survey of India which catalogued over 700 linguistic varieties across the subcontinent as early as 1927. Over time, the Schedule expanded beyond the original 14 languages to include Bodo, Dogri, Konkani, Maithili, Manipuri, Nepali, Santhali, and Sindhi, bringing the total to 22.
Sindhi was added through the 21st Amendment Act of 1967; Konkani, Manipuri, and Nepali were added by the 71st Amendment Act of 1992; and Bodo, Dogri, Maithili, and Santhali were included through the 92nd Amendment Act of 2003.
Notably, the Constituent Assembly did not lay down any formal criteria for the inclusion of languages in the Eighth Schedule. However, from time to time, efforts have been made by various committees, such as the Ashok Pahwa Committee (1996) and the Sitakant Mohapatra Committee (2003), to define clearer criteria for inclusion.
Despite these efforts, no official standard has been adopted for selecting languages for the eight schedules. The Ministry of Home Affairs confirms this position: 'As the evolution of dialects and languages is dynamic, influenced by socio-eco-political developments, it is difficult to fix any criterion for languages, whether to distinguish them from dialects or for inclusion in the Eighth Schedule to the Constitution of India.'
📍Part XVII – Official Language
Part XVII of the constitution of India deals with the official languages in Articles 343 to 351.
Clause 1 of Article 343 ('Official language of the Union') says 'The official language of the Union shall be Hindi in Devanagari script', and 'The form of numerals to be used for the official purposes of the Union shall be the international form of Indian numerals.'
Article 343(2) says that 'for a period of fifteen years from the commencement of this Constitution, the English language shall continue to be used for all the official purposes of the Union for which it was being used immediately before such commencement'. The Constitution of India commenced, or came into force, on January 26, 1950.
Under Article 343(3), 'Parliament may by law provide for the use, after the said period of fifteen years, of— (a) the English language, or (b) the Devanagari form of numerals, for such purposes as may be specified in the law.'
On January 26, 1965, Section 3 of the Official Languages Act, 1963 came into effect, which provided for the 'continuation of English Language for official purposes of the Union and for use in Parliament' even after the expiration of the 15-year period after the commencement of the Constitution.
Article 344 (1) provides for the constitution of a Commission by the President on expiration of five years from the commencement of the Constitution and thereafter at the expiration of ten years from such commencement, which shall consist of a Chairman and such other members representing the different languages specified in the Eighth Schedule.
Article 345 talks about the Official Language of a State, it says, 'Subject to the provisions of articles 346 and 347, the Legislature of a State may by law adopt any one or more of the languages in use in the State or Hindi as the language or languages to be used for all or any of the official purposes of that State: Provided that, until the Legislature of the State otherwise provides by law, the English language shall continue to be used for those official purposes within the State for which it was being used immediately before the commencement of this Constitution.'
📍Language to be Used in Representations for Redress of Grievances
According to Article 350, 'Every person shall be entitled to submit a representation for the redress of any grievance to any officer or authority of the Union or a State in any of the languages used in the Union or in the State, as the case may be.
📍Facilities for Instruction in Mother Tongue at Primary Stage
Article 350A provides special directive for the states and local authority within the State to provide adequate facilities for instruction in the mother-tongue at the primary stage of education to children belonging to linguistic minority groups; and the President may issue such directions to any State as he considers necessary or proper for securing the provision of such facilities.
📍Special Officer for linguistic minorities
The Constitution under Article 350B provides that 'There shall be a Special Officer for linguistic minorities to be appointed by the President.' Notably, it shall be the duty of the Special Officer to investigate all matters relating to the safeguards provided for linguistic minorities under this Constitution and report to the President upon those matters at such intervals as the President may direct, and the President shall cause all such reports to be laid before each House of Parliament, and sent to the Governments of the States concerned.
📍Directive for development of the Hindi language
Article 351 says 'It shall be the duty of the Union to promote the spread of the Hindi language, to develop it so that it may serve as a medium of expression for all the elements of the composite culture of India'.
However, the provision says, this must be done 'without interfering with its genius, the forms, style and expressions used in Hindustani and in the other languages of India specified in the Eighth Schedule'.
The classical languages serve as a custodian of India's heritage, embodying the essence of a community's historical and cultural milestone.- Ashwini Vaishnaw (Union Information & Broadcasting Minister)
Beyond official languages there is also a category of classical languages. These languages are considered the custodians of India's ancient and profound cultural heritage. They preserve the rich history, literature, and traditions of their respective communities. The government grants this status to languages to honour and safeguard the linguistic milestones of India's diverse cultural landscape.
Notably, in October 2004, the Centre decided to create a new category of languages as 'classical languages'. On October 12 in the same year, Tamil became the first Indian language to receive 'classical' status due to its high antiquity and rich literary tradition. In November 2004, a Linguistic Experts Committee (LEC) was constituted by the Ministry of Culture under the Sahitya Akademi to examine the eligibility of the languages proposed to be accorded classical language status.
Later, Tamil (2004), Sanskrit (2005), Kannada (2008), Telugu (2008), Malayalam (2013), and Odia (2014) were given the classical languages status. On July 25, 2024, the LEC unanimously revised the criteria for classical status and recommended the following languages to be considered as classical languages: Marathi, Pali, Prakrit, Assamese, and Bengali. In October last year, 'Classical Language' status was granted to recommended languages, and it brought the total number of officially designated classical languages to 11.
Notably, among all the classical languages, Prakrit and Pali are the two classical languages that are not mentioned in the eighth schedule of the Indian Constitution.
📍Marathi: Modern Marathi descends from Maharashtri Prakrit, a Prakrit dialect used in western India which was the official language of the Satvahanas. Some Marathi scholars have claimed that this was the first among Prakrit languages, but this claim is contested. The oldest evidence of Maharashtri Prakrit can be found in a stone inscription in Pune district, dated to the 1st century BCE. The earliest evidence of the more modern Marathi can be traced to a copper-plate inscription found in Satara, dated to 739 CE.
📍Bengali & Assamese: Both these languages can find their origin in Magadhi Prakrit, a form of Prakrit popular in East India, and the official language of the Magadha court. The exact date in which they emerged is contested, with scholars putting forward dates of origin ranging from the 6th to the 12th centuries. They took on a form which may be recognisable today well into the second millennium CE.
📍Prakrit: There is no single Prakrit language. Rather, the term refers to a group of closely-related Indo-Aryan languages, whose defining feature was that they were the language of the masses as opposed to Sanskrit, which was restricted to the elites and high literature. Historian A L Basham wrote in The Wonder that was India (1954): 'By the time of the Buddha the masses were speaking languages which were much simpler than Sanskrit. These were the Prakrits, of which several dialects have been attested.' These vernaculars were thus also the language of popular heterodox religions that emerged in the first millennium BCE.
📍Pali: Pali has traditionally been identified with Magadhi Prakrit, with the word 'pali' meaning 'lines or series', a reference to Pali being the language of the series of Buddhist texts. Some modern scholars, however, believe Pali to be a mix of several Prakrit languages (including more western dialects), which were combined and partially Sanskritised.
Pali is also known as the language of the Theravada Buddhist canon. The Pali Canon falls into three general categories or pitaka (basket). Together, it is thus known as Tipitaka ('three baskets').
The classical language status holds great importance for the preservation of India's linguistic and cultural heritage. The status of 'Classical language' for languages not only elevates their stature but also facilitates efforts toward the promotion, preservation, and further research of these languages, ensuring their continued relevance in the modern world.
Classical Language status can also aid a language in addressing contemporary challenges like digitalisation and globalisation. It is also expected to create employment opportunities in the fields of academics and research. The tasks of preservation, documentation, and digitisation of ancient texts of these languages will likely generate jobs in archiving, translation, publishing, and digital media.
The world is facing the danger of losing its languages, several of which are listed as endangered, and the loss of languages equates to loss of culture. — Dr K Sreenivasarao (Secretary of the Sahitya Akademi)
According to experts, nearly 40 per cent of the world's 7,000 languages, including dialects spoken by indigenous people groups, have already disappeared, and several others are on the verge of getting extinct.
The official website of UNESCO informs us: 'A language is in danger when its speakers cease to use it, use it in an increasingly reduced number of communicative domains, and cease to pass it on from one generation to the next. That is, there are no new speakers, adults or children.'
UNESCO has categorised languages on the basis of endangerment as (i) Vulnerable (ii) Definitely Endangered (iii) Severely Endangered (iv) Critically Endangered.
India writes in many languages and speaks in many more voices, but not all languages are listed in the Eighth Schedule of the Indian Constitution or given the tag of classical languages; often, these languages face the challenge of extinction and become endangered languages.
Literary critic and activist Ganesh Narayan Devy, in an interview with Adrija Roychowdhury of The Indian Express in 2020, said – 'According to UNESCO, any language that is spoken by less than 10,000 people is potentially endangered. In India, after the 1971 census, the government decided that any language spoken by less than 10,000 people need not be included in the official list of languages. In India, therefore, all the languages that are spoken by less than 10,000 people are treated by the state as not worthy of mention and treated by the UNESCO as potentially endangered. As per my survey, there are close to 780 languages in India, out of which about 600 are potentially endangered. The census of 1991 and 2001 show not more than 122 languages. So, most others have to be called potentially endangered.
Examples of such languages would be Wadari, Kolhati, Golla, Gisari. These are languages of nomadic people in Maharashtra, Karnataka and Telangana. Then there several tribal languages as well, such as Pauri, Korku, Haldi, Mavchi. In Assam, there is Moran, Tangsa, Aiton. There seems to be about 250 languages that disappeared in the last 60 years. There used to be languages called Adhuni, Dichi, Ghallu, Helgo, Katagi. The Bo language in Andaman disappeared in 2010 and the Majhi language in Sikkim disappeared in 2015. But we need to remember that it is impossible to show a language dying in the last moment of its life. A language is not a single life system. It is a very large symbolic system. When the symbols collapse they do not do so in a single moment. The collapse is sprayed over a large time.'
Do you Know?
Each language's extinction causes a permanent loss of distinctive ecological, historical, and cultural knowledge. Every language is a unique expression of the human experience of the world. Additionally, the Constitution of India has included the clause to protect minority languages as a fundamental right. Article 29 states, 'Any section of the citizens residing in the territory of India or any part thereof having a distinct language, script or culture of its own shall have the right to conserve the same.'
In this context, recognising the significance of language preservation, various initiatives have been taken at both the national and global levels.
📍Scheme for Protection and Preservation of Endangered Languages (SPPEL)
The Government of India is running the Scheme for Protection and Preservation of Endangered Languages (SPPEL). It was instituted by the Ministry of Education (Government of India) in 2013.
The objective of the scheme is to document and archive the country's languages that have become endangered or are likely to be endangered in the near future. The scheme is monitored by the Central Institute of Indian Languages (CIIL) located in Mysuru, Karnataka. The CIIL has collaborated with various universities and institutes across India for this mission.
Without adequate documentation, a language that is extinct can never be revived. -UNESCO
The languages which are spoken by fewer than 10,000 speakers or languages which have not been linguistically studied earlier are chiefly considered to be documented in this scheme. Presently, 117 languages have been listed for the documentation.
📍Initiatives of the University Grants Commission (UGC)
The University Grants Commission (UGC) has also initiated two schemes for the protection of endangered languages, namely 'Funding Support to the State Universities for Study and Research in Indigenous and Endangered Languages in India' and 'Establishment of Centres for Endangered Languages in Central Universities'.
📍International Decade of Indigenous Languages (2022-2032)
UNESCO has declared the years between 2022 and 2032 as the International Decade of Indigenous Languages for their protection and propagation.
Do you Know?
📍UNESCO World Atlas of Languages
The UNESCO World Atlas of Languages is a dynamic and interactive online tool, constantly updated by users, which documents different aspects and features of language status, vitality, endangerment and sustainability. It is a detailed record of languages. It is a unique resource for language preservation, monitoring, promotion and knowledge sharing on language-related issues, as well as an interactive tool for language teaching and learning.
Prelims
(1) The Constitution (71st Amendment) Act, 1992 amends the Eighth Schedule to the Constitution to include which of the following languages? (UPSC 2024)
1. Konkani
2. Manipuri
3. Nepali
4. Maithili
Select the correct answer using the code given below:
(a) 1, 2 and 3
(b) 1, 2 and 4
(c) 1, 3 and 4
(d) 2, 3 and 4
(2) Consider the following languages: (UPSC CSE 2014)
1. Gujarati
2. Kannada
3. Telugu
Which of the above has/have been declared as 'Classical Language/Languages' by the Government?
(a) 1 and 2 only
(b) 3 only
(c) 2 and 3 only
(d) 1, 2 and 3
(3) Which one of the following was given classical language status recently? (UPSC CSE 2015)
(a) Odia
(b) Konkani
(c) Bhojpuri
(d) Assamese
(4) Consider the following languages:
1. Manipuri
2. Bodo
3. Kashmiri
What is the correct chronological order of these languages as they were included in the eighth schedule of the Constitution of India?
(a) 3—2—1
(b) 1—2—3
(c) 2—1—3
(d) 3—1—2
(5) The Ashok Pahwa Committee (1996) and Sitakant Mohapatra Committee (2003) were associated with:
(a) Reforms in the Lok Sabha
(b) Caste Census
(c) Eighth Schedule
(d) Delimitation
Mains
1. What are the criteria for a language's designation as a 'classical language'? Discuss the significance of India's recent designation of five languages as classical languages.
2. 'The inclusion of languages in the Eighth Schedule of the Indian Constitution has led to both empowerment and marginalisation.' Discuss the constitutional provisions related to language recognition and analyse their impact on linguistic diversity in India.​
(Sources: India has chosen diversity when it comes to language, Knowledge Nugget | Demand for inclusion of Kokborok and Bhojpuri in Eighth Schedule, Knowledge Nugget: Classical languages, The languages India speaks, Government grants 'Classical Language' status, Which are India's 5 new 'classical languages', Prakrit & Pali (IE), The language used in courts (IE), http://www.sppel.org, 'There are 600 potentially endangered languages in India..' )
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Roshni Yadav is a Deputy Copy Editor with The Indian Express. She is an alumna of the University of Delhi and Jawaharlal Nehru University, where she pursued her graduation and post-graduation in Political Science. She has over five years of work experience in ed-tech and media. At The Indian Express, she writes for the UPSC section. Her interests lie in national and international affairs, governance, economy, and social issues. You can contact her via email: [e-mail] ... Read More