Languages of India

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There is no national language in India. Rather, Hindi is the "official" language.  There are various recognised languages in India depending on the state or territory you are in. However, section 343(1) of the Indian constitution directly states: "The official language of the Union shall be Hindi in the Devanagari script. The form of numerals to be used for the official purposes of the Union shall be the international form of Indian numerals." The business in Indian parliament can only be transacted in Hindi or in English. English is allowed to be used in official purposes such as parliamentary proceedings, judiciary, and communications between the central government and a state government.

The Constitution lists 22 scheduled languages of India: Assamese, Bengali, Bodo, Dogri, Gujarati, Hindi, Kannada, Kashmiri, Konkani, Maithili, Malayalam, Manipuri, Marathi, Nepali, Odia, Punjabi, Sanskrit, Santali, Sindhi, Tamil, Telugu, and Urdu.

 List of Languages of the Indian State 
This table shows the most spoken language and other official languages in each Indian state or territory.
State / Union TerritoryMost Spoken LanguageOther Official LanguagesAndhra PradeshTeluguArunachal PradeshEnglishNyishiAssamAssameseBiharHindiChhattisgarhHindiGoaKonkaniGujaratGujaratiHaryanaHindiHimachal PradeshHindiJharkhandHindiKarnatakaKannadaKeralaMalayalamMadhya PradeshHindiMaharashtraMarathiManipurMeiteiMeghalayaKhasiEnglishMizoramMizoEnglishNagalandEnglishAngamiOdishaOdiaPunjabPunjabiRajasthanHindiSikkimNepaliEnglish, Sikkimese (Bhutia), LepchaTamil NaduTamilTelanganaTeluguTripuraBengaliKokborok, EnglishUttar PradeshHindiUttarakhandHindiWest BengalBengaliAndaman & Nicobar Islands (UT)HindiEnglishChandigarh (UT)HindiPunjabi, EnglishDadra & Nagar Haveli (UT)GujaratiHindi, EnglishDaman & Diu (UT)GujratiHindi, EnglishDelhi (NCT)HindiEnglish, Punjabi, UrduJammu & Kashmir (UT)KashmiriDogri, Hindi, Urdu, EnglishLadakh (UT)LadakhiHindi, English, UrduLakshadweep (UT)MalayalamJeseri, Mahl, EnglishPuducherry (UT)TamilTelugu, Malayalam, French, English
Notice: When a state is marked with (UT), it means it is an Indian territory, not state. An example is that Puerto Rico is a US territory or Hong Kong is a Chinese territory. If there is a blank space in the third column, that means there is only one official language.

Related pages
Languages of South Asia

References

Other websites
 Kulkarni-Joshi, Sonal. "Linguistic history and language diversity in India: Views and counterviews." Journal of Biosciences 44 (2019): 1-10.