IN
Republic of India
India
Summary
India is a country in Asia that is home to 1,380,004,000 people. It is also home to 424 living indigenous languages. One of these, Hindi, is an official language of the country. Others—Assamese, Assamese, Bengali, Bengali, Eastern Punjabi, Eastern Punjabi, Garo, Garo, Gujarati, Gujarati, Kannada, Kannada, Kashmiri, Kashmiri, Khasi, Khasi, Konkani, Konkani, Maithili, Maithili, Malayalam, Malayalam, Marathi, Marathi, Meitei, Meitei, Nepali, Odia, Odia, Tamil, Telugu, Telugu, Urdu, and Urdu—are official languages in parts of the country. India was also home to 11 indigenous languages that are now extinct. In addition, 29 living non-indigenous languages are established within the country. One of these, English, is also an official language of the country. In formal education, 27 indigenous languages are used as languages of instruction.
At a Glance
Languages
Families
Sino-Tibetan (148) Indo-European (140) Dravidian (84) Austro-Asiatic (32) Andamanese (14) Kra-Dai (5) Creole (4) Language isolate (2) Sign language (2) Mixed language (1) Pidgin (1) Unclassified (1)
Language Policy Conventions
India has adopted the following international conventions which speak to indigenous language rights.