Official Languages in India

Reviewed by:

Nafeez Khan

How Many Languages are Accepted in Indian Constitution?

According to the eighth schedule of the constitution of India released in 2018, the total official language of India is twenty-two. Initially, it was fourteen languages. Part XVII of the Indian constitution mainly deals with the number of official languages in India. The list of official languages in the constitution of India is provided in articles 343 to 351. This constitution does not specify the official language of the different states. While the constitution was enacted, they released the list of official languages of India in the name of the Official Languages Commission. They also wrote the constitution of India in English and Hindi languages initially. So, many considered Hindi and English as the official languages of the union. Later, the government of India took responsibility for measuring the development of the languages in India and created the list of official languages in India. This article will provide details about how many languages are recognized by the constitution of India as official languages and its details here.

Eight Schedule of Indian Constitution

The constitution of India has a total of 12 schedules. Each and every schedule in the Indian constitution is important. In this article, we are discussing article 344(1) of eight schedules of the Indian constitution, because it is mainly dealing with the list of official languages in the constitution of India

Article 344 → Committee and Commission of Parliament on official language
Article 344(1)

Under Article 344(1), the commission was established by the president with a tenure of 5 years. The tenure for the commencement of the Constitution is about 10 years. For this, they should comprise a Chairman and other members representing the various languages specified in the 8th Schedule. Based on the recommendations of the President for the dynamic use of Hindi for official purposes of the Government of India.

The below table shows the list of official languages in the constitution of India, with the people who spoke the language and the year they became the official language of India.

List of Official Languages in the Constitution of India

S.No	Language	Year the language became the official language of India	Spoken in the States
1	Assamese	1950	People from Assam and Arunachal Pradesh will speak Assamese.
2	Benga	1950	People from Assam, West Bengal, Andaman islands and Tripura will speak Benga. People in Bangladesh also use this language.
3	Gujarati	1950	Gujarati is spoken by the people from Gujarat, Daman and Diu
4	Hindi	1950	Most of the people located in North India and central India will speak Hindi
5	Kannada	1950	Karnataka people will use Kannada and it is their official language.
6	Kashmiri	1950	Kashmir people will use Kashmiri for communication.
7	Konkani	1950	Konkani is the official language of Goa. People from the southern part of Maharashtra, Kerala, and Karnataka will also speak in Konkani.
8	Malayalam	1950	Malayalam is the official language of Kerala and Lakshadweep. But people from Karnataka, Tamilnadu also speaks Malayalam.
9	Manipuri	1950	People from Tripura, Manipur, Assam, Mizoram, Bangladesh, and Myanmar will commonly use Manipuri.
10	Marathi	1950	Even though Marathi is the official language of people in Maharashtra, people from Karnataka, Goa, Daman, and Diu, Dada Nagar Haveli, and Gujarat are also using Marathi for communication.
11	Nepali	1950	Nepali is the official language of Nepal. But the people speaking Nepali are widely spread among the Sikkim, West Bengal, Tibet, Myanmar, Bhutan, and other North-eastern states
12	Odia	1950	Odia is the official language of Odisha. And people in Odisha are mainly speaking in Odia.
13	Punjabi	1950	Punjabi is the principal language of people in Punjab. People from Himachal Pradesh, Delhi, Pakistan, Haryana, Rakasthan, Canada, the USA, and Australia are also using Punjabi.
14	Sanskrit	1950	People from any part of India is not using Sanskrit for communication except people in Mattur village in Karnataka. People in India are mainly using Sanskrit in temples.
15	Sindhi	1950	People from Gujarat and the Sindh province of Pakistan are using the Sindhi language.
16	Tamil	1950	Tamil is the official language of Tamil Nadu and Puducherry. People from Singapore, Vietnam, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, and Mauritius are also using Tamil for communication.
17	Urdu	1950	Urdu is an additional official language for some states like Jammu & Kashmir, Delhi, Bihar, Telangana, and Uttar Pradesh. About 4.81 crores people in India, 1.07 crores people in Pakistan, 6.5 lacs people from Bangladesh and 4 lacs people from Britain are using Urdu
18	Telugu	1950	Telugu is the official language of people from Andhra Pradesh and Telangana. People from Puducherry, Tamil Nadu, Odisha, Karnataka, and Chhattisgarh are also speaking this language.
19	Bodo	2004	People from the Tibetan-Burmese region will speak Bodo or Baro language. People living in the northeast part of India, Nepal, and Bangladesh are also using this language for communication.
20	Dogri	2004	People from Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, and Punjab are speaking the Dogri language. Dogri language is mainly originated from Punjabi.
21	Maithili	2004	People speaking the Maithili language are widely spread in the northern region of Bihar and the Valley of Nepal.
22	Santali	2004	People speaking the Santali language are widely spread over the Jharkhand, Bihar, Assam, Tripura, Odisha, Chhattisgarh, and Bengal. People are located in Bangladesh, Nepal, and Bhutan also speak the Santali language for communication.

The above table shows the list of official languages in India, with their native state. From this article, we came to know about how the Indian constitution accepted the language as the official language and the year the language became the official language of the nation.

FAQs on Official Languages in India

1. Which language is the oldest in India?

Sanskrit is India’s oldest language. People in India are using Sanskrit before 5,000 years that is before Christ. Sanskrit is also the official language of India. People in India are using Sanskrit mainly for worship instead of speech.

2. How many languages are spoken in India in total?

According to the information given by the Press Trust of India, People in India are speaking more than 19,500 languages in India. According to the latest analysis of the census, more than 10,000 people in India are speaking 121 languages. The total population of India is more than 121 crores.

3. How many official languages are listed in the Constitution of India?

As per the eighth schedule of the Indian constitution, India has 22 official languages. All these 22 official languages of India are the scheduled languages and are providing official encouragement.