India

The Indian subcontinent consists of a number of separate linguistic communities each of which share a common language and culture. The people of India speak many languages and dialects which are mostly varieties of about principal languages. Some Indian languages have a long literary history Sanskrit literature is more than years old and Tamil . India also has some languages that do not have written forms. There are officially recognized languages in India Konkani, Manipuri and Nepali were added in each has produced a literature of great vitality and richness.

Though distinctive in parts, all stand for a homogeneous culture that is the essence of the great Indian literature. This is an evolution in a land of myriad dialects. The number of people speaking each language varies greatly. For example, Hindi has more than million speakers, but relatively few people speak Andamanese.Although some of the languages are called tribal or aboriginal, their populations may be larger than those that speak some European languages. For example, Bhili and Santali, both tribal languages, each have more than million speakers. Gondi is spoken by nearly million people. India's schools teach different languages. The nation has newspapers in languages, radio programmes in , and films in.


The Indian languages belong to four language families: Indo-European, Dravidian, Mon Khmer, and Sino Tibetan. Indo European and Dravidian languages are used by a large majority of India's population. The language families divide roughly into geographic groups. Languages of the Indo European group are spoken mainly in northern and central regions.The languages of southern India are mainly of the Dravidian group. Some ethnic groups in Assam and other parts of eastern India speak languages of the Mon Khmer group.


People in the northern Himalayan region and near the Burmese border speak Sino Tibetan languages. Speakers of different languages of the Indo European family make up about three quarters of India's population. Twenty Dravidian languages are spoken by nearly a quarter of the people. Speakers of Mon Khmer languages and Sino Tibetan languages together make up about per cent of the population.