Hindi added most speakers in 10 yrs: Where do other Indian languages stand?

Marathi with 83 million speakers displaced Telugu (81 million) to become the third most common mother tongue after Hindi and Bengali.

Hindi was the fastest growing language in India at 25.19% adding close to a 100 million speakers between 2001-2011.

Kashmiri (22.97%), Gujarat (20.4%), Manipuri (20.07%), and Bengali (16.63%) are the second, third and fourth fastest growing languages, respectively, according to new census data.

Hindi (520 million speakers) and Bengali (97 million speakers) remain the most spoken and the second most spoken language across the country.

There are now 260,000 people who deem English as their mother tongue; up from 226,000 in 2001, an increase of 14.67%.

The most number of English speakers are from Maharashtra (104,000) followed by Tamil Nadu and Karnataka.

Sanskrit remains the least spoken among the scheduled languages – officially recognised – with 24,821 speakers despite an increase of 76% from 2001.

Two scheduled languages have witnessed a drop in the number of people referring to them as their mother tongues: Urdu declined by 1.58% and Konkani by 9.54%.

Of the 99 unscheduled languages, Bhili/Bhilodi continue to have the most speakers (104 million marked it as their mother tongue), up from 95 million in 2001.

Gondi retained its second position with 29 million speakers, up from 27 million in 2001.

Bhili/Bhilodi is predominantly spoken by the Bhil people who are native to Gujarat, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh.

Gondi is spoken by the Gonds who primarily inhabit Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Chhattisgarh, Orissa, Uttar Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh Telangana, Maharashtra, Bihar and Karnataka.

Tamil (-5%) and Malayalam (-10%) speaking population are falling across most states in north India even as Tamil Nadu and Kerala saw over 33% increase in the number of Hindi, Bengali, Assamese and Odia speakers, indicating a reverse migration trend from earlier decades when people from the two southern states migrated in large numbers to the north, The Times of India reported on June 28, 2018.

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