Languages of Karnataka, Goa, Andhra Pradesh, and Telengana

[vijayjohn]

Bengaluru is the capital of Karnataka, a large state in South India. The state to its northwest is Goa, and Andhra Pradesh is to the east of Karnataka. Telangana lies between them and was separated from Andhra Pradesh seven years ago. The official language of Goa is Konkani; that of Karnataka, Kannada; and that of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, Telugu. Telangana also has Urdu as an additional official language, presumably because of its capital, Hyderabad, and the long history of Urdu in this area.

Many other language varieties are also spoken in Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, and Telengana. The most famous of these, apart from Konkani, is probably Tulu, which is also spoken in Kerala. As in Kerala and Tamil Nadu to the south, many of these language varieties are Dravidian, but Marathi is also spoken in Karnataka, Goa, and Telangana. Another Indo-Aryan language variety spoken in Telangana is that of the Banjara people, a historically nomadic people spread out over a large area in India and who claim to be closely related to the Roma.

In Andhra Pradesh, near the border with Odisha to the northeast, there is also a Munda language called Sora spoken.