India is a vast country spread over an area of 3.28 million square kilometers and is home to a population of approximately 1.10 billion that is second only to China. It is having 35 states and union territories wherein 1652 langauges are spoken out of which 29 are spoken by a population of 1 million or more. Although Hindi that is written in the Devnagri script is India's official language, English is the supporting language. The Indian constitution has recognized 22 languages. Some Indian languages have a long literary history--Sanskrit literature is more than 5,000 years old and Tamil language is 3,000 years old. India also has some languages that do not have written forms.

Indian languages can be classified in to four families viz. Indo-European, Dravidian, Mon-Khmer, and Sino-Tibetan. Most of the Indian population speaks the languages that have descended from Indo-European and Dravidian origin. Indian states are divided on the basis of language contiguity. Languages that have originated from Indo-European group are spoken mainly in northern and central regions. Similarly the languages of southern part of India have mainly originated from Dravidian group. Mon-Khmer group langauges comprise of the ones spoken in Assam and other parts of eastern India. In the mountainous region of northern Himalaya and near the Burmese border, people speak Sino-Tibetan languages.