Multilingualism in India
The Constitution of India designates the official languages of India as Hindi and English.[1] The number of bilingual speakers in India is 314.9 million, which is 26% of the population in 2011.[2]
Multilingualism
Hindi
Hindi is one of the official languages of India and had 528 million native speakers as of the 2011 Census. About 139 million Indians speak Hindi as a second language and 24 million speak it as their third language.
| Language | First language speakers[5] |
First language speakers as a percentage of total population |
Second language speakers [6] |
Third language speakers [6] |
Total speakers | Total speakers as a percentage of total population |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hindi | 528,347,193 | 43.63 | 139,000,000 | 24,000,000 | 692,000,000 | 57.1 |
| English | 259,678 | 0.02 | 83,000,000 | 46,000,000 | 129,000,000 | 10.6 |
| Bengali | 97,237,669 | 8.3 | 9,000,000 | 1,000,000 | 107,000,000 | 8.9 |
| Marathi | 83,026,680 | 7.09 | 13,000,000 | 3,000,000 | 99,000,000 | 8.2 |
| Telugu | 81,127,740 | 6.93 | 12,000,000 | 1,000,000 | 95,000,000 | 7.8 |
| Tamil | 69,026,881 | 5.89 | 7,000,000 | 1,000,000 | 77,000,000 | 6.3 |
| Gujarati | 55,492,554 | 4.74 | 4,000,000 | 1,000,000 | 60,000,000 | 5 |
| Urdu | 50,772,631 | 4.34 | 11,000,000 | 1,000,000 | 63,000,000 | 5.2 |
| Kannada | 43,706,512 | 3.73 | 14,000,000 | 1,000,000 | 59,000,000 | 4.94 |
| Odia | 37,521,324 | 3.2 | 5,000,000 | 390,000 | 43,000,000 | 3.56 |
| Malayalam | 34,838,819 | 2.97 | 500,000 | 210,000 | 36,000,000 | 2.9 |
| Punjabi | 33,124,726 | 2.83 | 2,230,000 | 720,000 | 36,600,000 | 3 |
| Assamese | 15,311,351 | 1.26 | 7,488,153 | 740,402 | 23,539,906 | 1.94 |
| Sanskrit | 0[7][8][9] | 0 | 1,230,000 | 1,960,000 | 3,190,000 | 0.19 |
Multilingualism by state
Combined percentages of first, second and third language speakers of Hindi and English in India from the 2011 Census.[10]
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| State or union territory | Hindi | English |
|---|---|---|
| India | 57.11% | 10.62% |
| Andaman and Nicobar Islands | 79.87% | 21.94% |
| Andhra Pradesh (incl. Telangana) | 12.59% | 13.06% |
| Arunachal Pradesh | 62.76% | 23.08% |
| Assam | 25.24% | 8.05% |
| Bihar | 89.37% | 2.72% |
| Chandigarh | 94.05% | 41.62% |
| Chhattisgarh | 93.64% | 2.29% |
| Dadra and Nagar Haveli | 57.50% | 10.34% |
| Daman and Diu | 76.19% | 15.38% |
| Delhi | 96.75% | 31.72% |
| Goa | 53.34% | 41.80% |
| Gujarat | 43.63% | 12.44% |
| Haryana | 95.34% | 15.59% |
| Himachal Pradesh | 96.57% | 10.64% |
| Jammu and Kashmir (incl. Ladakh) | 38.00% | 15.98% |
| Jharkhand | 85.43% | 5.15% |
| Karnataka | 12.27% | 11.83% |
| Kerala | 9.12% | 20.15% |
| Lakshadweep | 17.87% | 19.30% |
| Madhya Pradesh | 95.74% | 5.44% |
| Maharashtra | 52.09% | 14.32% |
| Manipur | 18.44% | 31.62% |
| Meghalaya | 13.95% | 15.61% |
| Mizoram | 7.01% | 15.50% |
| Nagaland | 15.89% | 32.57% |
| Odisha | 18.76% | 17.23% |
| Puducherry | 3.87% | 28.10% |
| Punjab | 51.04% | 30.05% |
| Rajasthan | 95.04% | 4.55% |
| Sikkim | 47.96% | 27.69% |
| Tamil Nadu | 2.11% | 18.49% |
| Tripura | 9.95% | 7.53% |
| Uttar Pradesh | 97.40% | 6.42% |
| Uttarakhand | 97.19% | 8.36% |
| West Bengal | 13.83% | 6.70% |
See also
- Languages of India
- Languages with official status in India
- List of languages by number of native speakers in India
References
- ^ "Constitutional Provisions: Official Language Related Part-17 of The Constitution Of India". Department of Official Language, Government of India. Archived from the original on 1 February 2016. Retrieved 1 July 2015.
- ^ "Hindi migrants speaking Marathi rise to 60 lakh". The Times of India.
- ^ "How languages intersect in India". Hindustan Times. 22 November 2018.
- ^ "How many Indians can you talk to?".
- ^ ORGI. "Census of India: Comparative speaker's strength of Scheduled Languages-1951, 1961, 1971, 1981, 1991 ,2001 and 2011" (PDF).
- ^ a b c "Census of India Website : Office of the Registrar General & Census Commissioner, India". www.censusindia.gov.in. Archived from the original on 13 November 2019.
- ^ "Searching for Sanskrit Speakers in the Indian Census". The Wire. Retrieved 9 February 2021.
- ^ "The Myth of 'Sanskrit Villages' and the Realm of Soft Power". The Wire. Retrieved 9 February 2021.
- ^ Sreevatsan, Ajai (10 August 2014). "Where are the Sanskrit speakers?". The Hindu. ISSN 0971-751X. Retrieved 9 February 2021.
- ^ Sen, Sumant (4 June 2019). "Hindi the first choice of people in only 12 States". The Hindu.
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