Indian Languages DR. MAHIPAL SINGH RATHORE

Introduction

• Language in its literary meaning is a system of communication through speech.

• A language family includes individual languages related through a common ancestor that existed before the recorded history.

• A lingua franca, also known as a bridge language, common language, trade language or vehicular language.

• Dialect is a form of language spoken in a local area.

• Several dialects can be derived from a particular language. The languages spoken around the various corners of India belong to several languages families where most of them belong to the Indo-Aryan group of languages.

• This Indo-Aryan group has been born out the Indo-European family. However, there are some language groups which are indigenous to the Indian sub-continent.

The Indian languages are grouped under

Indo-Aryan Group

Dravidian Group

Sino-Tibetan Group

Austric Group

A. Indo-Aryan Group

• It is a branch of the larger Indo-European family which came to India with the advent of the Aryans.

• It is the largest language group of India and around 74% of the Indians speak those languages which belong to this group.

• This language group is again sub-divided into three groups depending upon the time period of their origin-

1. Old Indo-Aryan Group

2. Middle Indo-Aryan Group

3. Modern Indo-Aryan Group

Old Indo-Aryan Group

• This group had its development around 1500 B.C. and Sanskrit was born out of this group.

• The ancient form of Sanskrit is what we find in the Vedas. Even Upanishads, Puranas and Dharmasutras were all written in Sanskrit.

• It can be said that Sanskrit is the mother of many Indian languages.

Sanskrit

• The development of Sanskrit grammar began with Panini in 400 B.C. with his book Asthadhyayi being the oldest book in Sanskrit grammar.

• The book Mahavastu of the Hinayana school is a treasure of stories. Lalitavistara, the most sacred Mahayana text and Ashvagosha‟s Buddhacharita were also written in Sanskrit.

• Sanskrit is the only language that transcended the barriers of region and boundaries.

Sanskrit

• The first evidence of the use of Sanskrit can be found in the inscriptions of Rudradamana at Junagarh in the present Southern Gujarat region.

• However it was the Gupta period when the use of Sanskrit in poetries can be traced. This is totally a period of creation of pure literature which is evident in the works as Mahakavyas (epics) and Khandakavyas (semi-epics).

• Many of the places developed during Gupta period is also written in Sanskrit.

• However, it is to be noted that one of the features of these places was the use of Sanskrit language by the characters of high varna and the use of Prakrit language by women and shudras.

Middle Indo-Aryan Group

• The period of development of this sub-group is between 600 BC to 1000 AD and started with the development of Prakrit language.

• Prakrit is a broader term under which all the Middle Indo-Aryan group languages are generally clubbed together.

• Many languages such as Ardha-Magadhi, Pali (used by Theravada Buddhists), Apabhramsha, find their origin from the Prakrit.

• Prakrit and Ardha-Magadhi language were used in the Jain „Agamas‟.

Prakrit Includes

• Pali: It was widely spoken in Magadha. It was popular during 5th- 1st century BC.

• It is closely related to Sanskrit, and the texts in Pali were written generally in Brahmi script.

• The Tripitaka of Buddhism were also written in Pali. It serves as the lingua franca of Theravada Buddhism.

• Magadhi Prakrit or Ardha-Magadhi: It is the most important kind of Prakrit. Its literary use increased after the decline of Sanskrit and Pali. Buddha and Mahavira perhaps spoke in Ardha-Magadhi.

Pali Language

Prakrit Includes

• Shauraseni: It was widely used to write dramas in the medieval India. It is a predecessor to Northern Indian languages. Jain monks wrote mainly in this version of Prakrit. An important text of Digambars, „Shatkhandgama‟ is written.

• Maharashtri Prakrit: Spoken till 9th century AD, it was a predecessor to Marathi and Konkani. It was used widely in western and southern India. It was the official language of Satavahana dynasty.

• Elu: ancient form of modern Sinhala language of Sri Lanka, it is similar to Pali.

• Paishachi: It is also called „Bhuta-Bhasa‟ (dead language) and it is often regarded as Prakrit. Gunadhya‟s Brihatkatha (6th century), an ancient epic is written in Paishachi.

Apabhramsa

• By 6th-7th century, the development of „Apabhramsa‟ (corrupt or non-grammatical) took place.

• Apabhramsa is also an umbrella term which means dialects other than Sanskrit or even Prakrit.

• It represents a transition from Middle to Modern Indo-Aryan Group of languages.

• Many Jain monks and scholars wrote extensively in Apabhramsa and sustained it.

• Major texts and writers are: Pushpadanta‟s Mahapurana (Digambara Jain text), Dhanapala‟s Bhavisayattakaha, etc.

Modern Indo-Aryan Group

• The languages belonging to this group are Hindi, Assamese, Bengali, Gujrati, Marathi, Punjabi, Rajasthani, Sindhi, Odia, Urdu etc.

• The languages under this sub-group developed gradually after 1000 AD.

The Indian languages are grouped under

Indo-Aryan Group

Dravidian Group

Sino-Tibetan Group

Austric Group

B.Dravidian Group

• This group comprises mainly of the languages spoken in the southern part of India.

• Around 25% of the Indian population is covered under this group. Proto Dravidian gave rise to 21 Dravidian languages.

• They can be broadly classified into three groups:

1. Northern group

2. Central group and

3. Southern group.

• Northern Group - It consist of three languages, i.e., Brahui,

Malto and Kurukh. Brahui is spoken in Baluchistan, Malto in the tribal areas of Bengal and Odisha while Kurukh in Bengal, Odisha, Bihar and Madhya Pradesh.

• Central Group -It consist of eleven languages i.e., Gondi, Khond, Kui, Manda, Parji, Gadaba, Kolami, Pengo, Naiki, Kuvi and Telugu.

• Only Telugu became a civilised language and is spoken in the state of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana whereas others are tribal languages.

Southern Group

• Seven languages belong this group.

• They are Kannada, Tamil, Malayalam, Tulu, Kodagu, Toda and Kota.

• Tamil is the oldest among all these.

Among these 21 languages of the Dravidian Group, the four major languages of the Dravidian group are:

• Telugu (numerically the largest of all Dravidian languages)

• Tamil (oldest and purest form of language)

• Kannada

• Malayalam (smallest and the youngest of the Dravidian group).

C. Sino-Tibetan Group

• Languages under this group belong to Mongoloid family.

• These languages are considered to be older than the Indo-Aryan languages and are referred to in the oldest Sanskrit literature as Kiratas.

• 0.6% of the Indian population speaks languages belonging to this group.

• The Sino-Tibetan group is further divided into:

1. Tibeto-Burman Languages

2. Siamese-Chinese

1. Tibeto-Burman Languages are further divided into four

groups.

(a) Tibetan - Sikkimese, Bhutia, Balti, Sherpa, Lahuli and Ladakhi

(b) Himalayan – Kinnauri and Limbu

(c) North Assam - Abor, Miri, Aka, Dafla and Mishmi

(d) Assam-Burmese- Kuki-chin, Mikir, Bodo and Naga. Manipuri or Meithi is the most important languages spoken under Kuki-chin sub-group.

2. Siamese-Chinese :- Ahom is one of the languages belonging to this group. However this language has already been extinct from the Indian sub continent.

D. Austric

• Languages under this group belong to Austro-asiatic sub-family which are represented by the languages of Munda or Kol group and spoken in Central, Eastern and North-Eastern India.

• The existence of these languages have been much before the advent of the Aryans and were referred to in ancient Sanskrit literature as Nisadas.

• Santhali is the most important language under this group which is spoken among by Santhal tribals of Jharkhand, Bihar and Bengal.

• With the exceptions of Khasi and Santhali, all Austro-asiatic languages on Indian territory are endangered.

OFFICIAL LANGUAGES OF INDIA

• Article 343 (1) of the Constitution of India states that “The Official Language of the Union Government shall be Hindi in Devanagari script.”

• “Unless Parliament decided otherwise, the use of English for official purposes was to cease 15 years after the Constitution came into effect”.

• This led to protests across the nation. The protest resulted in the enactment of the Official Language Act, 1963.

• English has been given the status of “subsidiary official language” of the union.

• The Constitution of India made a provision for each of the Indian states to choose their own official language.

• There are many languages listed in the Eighth Schedule of the Constitution which may be used by the States for the official purpose.

• Initially 14 languages were selected under Eighth Schedule. They were: • Assamese • Hindi • Malayalam • Punjabi • Telugu • Bengali • Kannada • Marathi • Sanskrit • Urdu • Gujarati • Kashmiri • Odia • Tamil

• Later Sindhi was added as the 15th language through 21st Amendment Act of 1967.

• Three more languages were added by 71st Amendment Act, 1992. They are Konkani, Manipuri, and Nepali.

• 92nd Amendment Act, 2003 added four more languages to the Eighth Schedule. They are Bodo, Maithili, Dogri and Santhali.

• At present there are 22 languages in total listed under the eighth schedule of the Indian Constitution.

Important notes on Official language

• There is no national language of India.

• Hindi is not a national language (only „official language‟)

• Neither does the Constitution nor any Act defines the national language.

• The Constitution does not specify the official language to be used by the States for the conduct of official function. States are free to adopt it.

• The language to be adopted by the States need not be one of those listed in the Eighth Schedule, and several States have adopted official language which are not listed.

• Example:

Tripura- Kokborok (belongs to Sino-Tibetan familly)

Puducherry - French

Mizoram-Mizo

English is the official language of Nagaland & Meghalaya.

****English is not in the list of 22 scheduled languages as per the Eighth schedule.

Classical Language Status

• In 2004, the Government of India declared that languages that meet certain requirements would be accorded the status of a “Classical Language in India”.

• Criteria The following criteria were laid down to determine the eligibility of languages to be considered for classification as a “Classical Language”.

1. High antiquity of its early texts/ recorded history over a period of 1500– 2000 years;

2. A body of ancient literature/ texts, which is considered a valuable heritage by generations of speakers;

3. The literary tradition be original and not borrowed from another speech community;

4. The classical language and literature being distinct from modern, there may also be a discontinuity between the classical language and its later forms or its offshoots.

Languages so far declared to be Classical language are:

Tamil in the year 2004

Sanskrit in the year 2005

Kannada in the year 2008

Telugu in the year 2008

Malayalam in the year 2013

Odia in the year 2014

Following benefits will accrue to a language declared as a

“Classical Language”:

• Two major international awards for scholars of eminence in Classical Indian Languages to be awarded annually.

• A „Centre of Excellence for Studies in Classical Languages‟ will be set up.

• The University Grants Commission will be requested to create and to start with at least in the Central Universities, a professional chair for the language

National Translation Mission (NTM)

• It is a Government of India scheme to facilitate higher education by making knowledge texts accessible to students and academies in Indian languages.

• NTM aims to disseminate knowledge in all Indian languages listed in the Eighth Schedule of the Constitution through translation.

• NTM aims to open up the vast body of knowledge by translating the higher education texts, available mostly in English, into Indian languages.

ANCIENT SCRIPTS OF INDIA

• The Indus script is a corpus of symbols produced by the Indus Valley Civilization. Most inscriptions are extremely short.

• Brahmi is the oldest writing systems used in the Indian subcontinent and in Central Asia during the final centuries BCE and the early centuries CE.

• The best-known Brahmi inscriptions are the rock-cut edicts of Ashoka in north-central India, dated to 250– 232 BCE.

• The script was deciphered in 1837 by James Prinsep.

• Brahmi is usually written from left to right. Brahmi is an abugida.

• Gupta script belongs to Gupta Empire and was used to write

Sanskrit.

• Gupta script descended from Brahmi and gave rise to the Nagari, Sharada and Siddham scripts.

• These scripts in turn gave rise to many of the most important scripts of India, including Devanagari, Gurmukhi script for Punjabi Language, Assamese script, Bengali script and the Tibetan script.

• The Kharosthi script (3rd Century BC –

3rd Century AD) is an ancient script used in ancient Gandhara (present Afghanistan and Pakistan) to write the Gandhari Prakrit and Sanskrit.

• It is a sister script of Brahmi and was deciphered by James Princep again.

• Kharosthi includes a set of numerals that are similar to Roman numerals like I, X, etc. Kharosthi is also an abugida.

• Kharosthi is mostly written right to left but some inscriptions also show the left to right direction of Kharosthi.

• The Vatteluttu alphabet is an abugida writing system

originating in South India.

• Developed from Tamil-Brahmi, Vatteluttu is one of the three main alphabet systems developed by Tamil people to write the Granthi or Pallava alphabet and the Tamil script.

• The Kadamba script marks the birth of a dedicated script for writing Kannada.

• It is also a descendant of the Brahmi script and developed during the reign of the Kadamba dynasty in the 4th-6th centuries.

• This script later became Kannada-Telegu script.

• The Grantha script was widely-used between the sixth century and the 20th centuries by Tamil speakers in South India, particularly in Tamil Nadu and Kerala, to write Sanskrit and the classical language Manipravalam, and is still in restricted use in traditional Vedic schools.

• It is a Brahmic script, having evolved from the Brahmi script in Tamil Nadu.

• The Malayalam script is a direct descendant of Grantha as are the Tigalari and Sinhala alphabets.

• The Sarada or Sharada script is an abugida writing system of the Brahmic family of scripts, developed around the 8th century.

• It was used for writing Sanskrit and Kashmiri.

• Originally more widespread, its use became later restricted to Kashmir.

• Gurmukhi is developed from the Sarada script and was standardised during the 16th century by Guru Angad.

• The whole of the Guru Granth Sahib is written in this script, and it is the script most commonly used by Sikhs and Hindus for writing the Punjabi language.

• Devanagari is an abugida alphabet of India and Nepal. It is written from left to right.

• The Devanagari script is used for over 120 languages, including Hindi, Marathi, Nepali, Pali, Konkani, Bodo, Sindhi and Maithili among other languages and dialects.

• Modi was an official script used to write Marathi until the 20th century when the Balbodh style of the Devanagari script was promoted as the standard writing system for Marathi.

• The Urdu alphabet is the right-to-left alphabet used for the Urdu language.

• It is a modification of the Persian alphabet, which is itself a derivative of the Arabic alphabet and has its origins in 13th century.

Thank You