India has lost over 200 languages in last 50 years: Survey

India has lost over 200 languages in last 50 years: Survey http://news.oneindia.in/2013/08/09/india-has-lost-over-200-languages-in-last-50yrs-survey-1279713.html Twenty languages in state on road to extinction, says survey Mumbai Mirror | Aug 9, 2013, 11.29 AM IST By Arita Sarkar About 20 indigenous languages of the state are fast disappearing, revealed a country-wide survey conducted by the People's Linguistic Survey of India (PLSI) after its completion was announced on Thursday. However, Maharashtra has the third-highest number of indigenous languages among India's 28 states. While Arunachal Pradesh topped the list with 90 languages, Assam qualified as second highest with 55 languages. Maharashtra took the third position, with 46 languages belonging to coastal, nomadic and adivasi communities, besides Marathi, which alone has 14 different dialects. Led by PLSI chairman Dr Ganesh Devy, the survey documented cultural and linguistic in formation on all language communities in India, especially the endangered ones. After 13 years of ideation among linguists and sociologists, over 3,000 volunteers, identified and documented the languages from each state. "From the best linguists to even bus drivers, all worked on this survey," said Dr Devy. With popular languages taking centrestage, several others are fast getting suppressed. Bhuti has gone extinct in the past 50 years, Nandiwale, Devre and Beldar are expected to disappear in 5 years. "About 200 languages have been lost over the last 50 years and can't be traced. Most of them are from nomadic communities who had no option of livelihood using those languages," said Dr Devy. According to Dr Arun Jakhade, editor of the Maharashtra PLSI, using mother tongues as the medium of education would vastly improve its quality. "In the rural parts of the state, Marathi is the most prevalent language in the education system. This is why about 20 languages in the state are on the decline. The education rates in the country can go higher if the education system incorporates the less popular indigenous languages," he said. Despite this, however, 779 other languages had survived the odds. "The English language has wiped out the indigenous languages of almost all the countries it was introduced in. India is the only one which survived," pointed out Dr Devy. Funded mainly by the Tata trust, Dr Devy expressed his dissatisfaction over the fact that the government had not taken an interest in the project. "The last such survey, conducted in 1928 by George Grierson, was funded by the Indian government. I am on several government committees, but funds are hard to come by," he said. The results of the study have been published in 50 volumes, which will be released next week. http://www.mumbaimirror.com/mumbai/others/Twenty-languages-in-state-on-road-to-extinction-says-survey/articleshow/21723519.cms