Languages, inequality and marginalization:

implications of the double divide

in Indian multilingualism

AJIT K. MOHANTY

Abstract

Features of Indian multilingualism are discussed to show that, despite several

positive forces favoring maintenance of minority languages, languages are
subjected to inequality and discrimination. It is argued that multilingualism in
India, as in other South Asian countries, is hierarchical in nature, character-
ized by a double divide — one between the elitist language of power and the
major regional languages (vernaculars) and, the other, between the regional
languages and the dominated ones. The nature and implications of this double
divide are analyzed in respect of the relative positions of English, Hindi, re-
gional majority languages and other indigenous/minority languages. The
paper shows that, at the same time as hierarchical multilingualism has led to a
general loss of linguistic diversity, the progressive domain shrinkage and the
marginalization of the surviving indigenous and minority languages affect the
dynamics of the relationship between languages and linguistic groups in
contact and negotiation of linguistic identities. The chasm between policy and
practice affecting the place of languages in society, it is argued, leads to edu-
cational failure, capability deprivation and poverty in the minority linguistic
groups, particularly the tribal mother tongue speakers. Programs of multilin-
gual education are briefly discussed in the context of recent attempts to deal
with classroom language disadvantage of tribal children in India.

Keywords: double divide; English-vernacular divide; English-other lan-

guage divide; language and education; multilingual education.

1. Introduction

With 196 endangered languages, India heads the list of countries in the Atlas of
the world’s languages in danger (UNESCO 2009). This in itself may not come
as a big surprise to many; the world has lost many languages and many more

0165–2516/10/0205–0131 Int’l. J. Soc. Lang. 205 (2010), pp. 131–154

© Walter de Gruyter DOI 10.1515/IJSL.2010.042

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132  A. K. Mohanty

will disappear if the current trend continues. Loss of languages is considered

by many as a “natural” outcome of organic decay of languages. However, as
Skutnabb-Kangas (2000) points out, language shift does not just happen with-
out any agency or intentionality; it is not a natural process of death of a lan-
guage with its speakers shifting voluntarily. She argues that the disappearance
of languages is better understood as a process of language murder, linguicide
or linguistic genocide. Unequal power relations between languages and lan-
guage communities are fundamental to her linguistic genocide paradigm. Lan-
guage shift and loss of linguistic diversity need to be seen as enforced by a set
of interrelated agencies — the languages and their speakers with unjust and
inequitable power and control over resources, state policies of discrimination
and homogenization, and socially constructed inequalities among languages
pushing some to disuse and marginalization. When loss of diversity is viewed
as an inevitable, natural and involuntary process, there is little one appears to
be able do about it apart from documenting the endangered and dying lan-
guages. An agentive perspective to loss of linguistic vitality, on the other hand,
has different consequences in enabling the analysis of the conditions associ-
ated with unequal and of hierarchical power relations among languages and
action for minimizing threats to languages. Discriminatory social, political and
economic practices are responsible for marginalization of some languages, lan-
guage shift and loss of linguistic diversity and the dynamics of such practices
need to be understood and resisted.
This paper attempts an analysis of the place of languages and their relation-
ship in the multilingual Indian society. It takes a position that loss of linguistic
vitality, marginalization and endangerment of languages in India are rooted in
structural inequalities in its hierarchical multilingualism. The major divisions
across the hierarchy between the elitist, dominant and dominated languages
are characterized as a linguistic double divide, which is related to complex
processes of negotiation of identities in situations of language contact and the
consequences of such contact. Implications of the double divide for multilin-
gualism and the role of languages in education in India are discussed.

2. Multilingualism in India

2.1. Some characteristic features of multilingualism in India

India’s linguistic diversity ranks fourth in the world (Skutnabb-Kangas 2000),

with varying estimates of 300 to 400 languages in the country belonging to five
language families. The 2001 Census Survey of India listed over 6,600 mother
tongues (MTs) specified by the respondents. These returns were rationalized
into 3592 MTs, out of which 1635 were listed and the remaining 1957, each

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 Languages, inequality and marginalization  133

with less than 10,000 speakers, were grouped under a single “other” MT cate-
gory. The 2001 Census grouped the MTs into 122 major languages. These
languages include 22 official languages listed in the VIIIth schedule of the
Constitution of India and English, which is recognized as an associate official
language. Indian society uses a large number of languages in different spheres
of public activities — over 104 for radio broadcasting, 87 for print media, 67
languages in primary education and 104 for adult literacy programs. However,
the uniqueness of Indian multilingualism goes beyond the simple presence of
many languages in different activities. The complex social-psychological and
socio-linguistic relationship between languages and their speakers and the role
that many languages play in the life-space of individuals and communities give
a very special character to Indian multilingualism. Sociolinguistic heterogene-
ity is deep-rooted, with linguistically pluralistic communities spread all over
the country — almost half of the districts having minority linguistic groups
exceeding 20% of the district population (Khubchandani 1986). Bhatia and
Ritchie (2004) view multilingualism in India as a “natural phenomenon”.

Centuries of coexistence and an ongoing process of convergence have led to an un-

marked pattern of widespread naturalistic linguistic coalescence rather than separation,
dominance and disintegration. (Bhatia and Ritchie 2004: 795)

In many respects, the ethos of language use in India is quite distinct from that
of the dominant monolingual societies.
India’s linguistic diversity goes down to the grass-roots level. Language
users all over the country mostly use two or more languages in different do-
mains of their daily life to communicate among themselves and with members
of different speech communities. Strikingly, despite the great linguistic diver-
sity, grass-roots level communication across the country remains open and un-
impaired (Khubchandani 1978; Pattanayak 1984).

If one draws a straight line between Kashmir and Kanyakumari and marks, say, every
five or ten miles, then one will find that there is no break in communication between any
two consecutive points. (Pattanayak 1981: 44)

The widespread individual and community level bilingualism facilitates com-

munication between different speech communities (Khubchandani 1978) and
it can be seen as constituting the first incremental step towards concentric
layers of societal multilingualism. In situations of contact between minority
and dominant languages, most of the minority language speakers tend to be-
come bilingual/multilingual in their MT as well as the dominant contact lan-
guages. This ensures inter-group communication as well as maintenance of
minority languages and stable multilingualism. Thus, minority languages in
India, in contact with other languages, tend to be maintained over generations.

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134  A. K. Mohanty

Large numbers of instances of language maintenance have led linguists to

support Pandit’s (1977) observation that in India language maintenance is
the norm and language shift a deviation. Linguistic communities in contact
maintain their languages not by rejecting the contact language but by lin‑
guistic accommodation (Bhatia and Ritchie 2004) and by becoming bilingual/
multilingual as an adaptive strategy — a process that effectively stabilizes the
relationship between individuals, communities and languages (Mohanty 1994,
2003a). In contrast, bilingualism in dominant monolingual societies is a point
in transition from monolingualism in a non-dominant native language to
monolingualism in the dominant language of the host society and language
shift is a common outcome of language contact. A high degree of maintenance
of languages is possible in India because of the fluidity of perceived bound­
aries between languages, smooth and complementary functional allocation of
languages into different domains of use, multiplicity of linguistic identities and
early multilingual socialization (Mohanty et al. 1999). However, as will be
shown later, such maintenance is not without its cost and consequences.
Grass-roots level co-existence and mutual contact between different lan-
guages, dialects, or speech styles and their users are accepted as natural aspects
of the multilingual life-style in India. Typically, language users move between
various patterns of language use in their social interactions and in various
domains of their daily life. Complementarities of relationship between lan-
guages are achieved by a smooth functional allocation of languages into differ-
ent domains of language use. Languages are neatly sorted into non-conflicting
spheres of activities such as home language, language of the market place,
language for religious rites, language for formal/official purposes and for inter-
group communication and so on. Under such conditions of multilingual func-
tioning, domain allocation of languages acknowledges the fact that no single
language is sufficient for communicative requirements in different situations
and occasions and, hence, individuals need multiple languages. The grounds of
domain-specific choices of languages are complex and social psychological;
they often signify expression of identities and attitudes and, more importantly,
different power relationships between the languages. Under such conditions,
code-mixing and code-switching have functional significance in communica-
tion and they often express multiple linguistic identities (Sridhar 1978; Verma
1976). Multiplicity of linguistic identities in India involves a spontaneous and
tension free movement between languages and a high degree of flexibility in
the perception of languages and their boundaries. On the basis of his analysis
of mother tongue declarations, Khubchandani (1983, 1986) shows how lan-
guage users move between languages, such as Hindi to Urdu, Hindi to Maithili
and Bhojpuri, etc., with the patterns of identities changing under various social
psychological conditions, which affect the dynamics of perception of mother
tongues and linguistic boundaries (Mohanty 1991, 1994).

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 Languages, inequality and marginalization  135

Multiple languages and multiple language identities are defining features of Indian (and
South Asian) bilingualism that reveal the dynamics of language usage and a constant
negotiation of identities. (Bhatia and Ritchie 2004: 795)

2.2. Multilingualism as a positive force: Indian research findings

The unique characteristics of Indian multilingualism, the pluralistic ethos and

early socialization into multilingual functioning seem to make multilingualism
a positive force. A review of cross-cultural research on bilingualism (Mohanty
and Perregaux 1997) shows that individual and community level multilin­
gualism has positive consequences, particularly when cultural pluralism and
multilingualism are accepted social norms. However, from a policy perspec-
tive, too many languages are sometimes viewed as a burden and a formidable
problem for language planning and education. Further, with the dynamics of
identity politics manipulating regional and linguistic identities, languages are
seen as divisive and disintegrative. Scholars of languages have often pleaded
for the preservation of linguistic diversity on ideological grounds and on
grounds of linguistic human rights. Some studies in India sought to examine
empirically questions relating to the social and psychological consequences of
multilingualism: (a) is mother tongue maintenance and multilingualism at the
individual and community level a barrier to intellectual and educational devel-
opment (and, thus, socio-economic mobility) of linguistic communities, par-
ticularly the disadvantaged minorities? and (b) does linguistic diversity and
bi-/multilingualism lead to social disintegration, as is commonly believed?
A series of studies over a period of two decades (Mohanty 1982a, 1982b,
1990a, 1990b; Mohanty and Babu 1983; Mohanty and Das 1987; discussed in
Mohanty 1994, 2003a; Mohanty and Perregaux 1997) examined the cognitive
and academic consequences of contact bilingualism among the Kond tribal1
people — a group of indigenous people of Kandhamala district of Orissa,
India. These studies compared Kui-Oriya bilingual and Oriya monolingual
Kond children on a number of cognitive, metalinguistic and academic mea-
sures. Kui (of the Indo-Dravidian language family) is the indigenous language
(and language of identity) of the Konds who are in contact with non-tribal
speakers of Oriya (of the Indo-Aryan language family), the regional lingua
franca and the official language of the province of Orissa. Owing to a historical
process of frozen language shift, resulting in Kui to Oriya shift in some parts
of the district and stable Kui-Oriya contact bilingualism in the remaining areas,
it was possible, in these studies, to draw matched samples of bilinguals and
monolinguals from the same cultural group. Thus, there was the method­
ological advantage of drawing bilingual and monolingual samples from within
the same cultural group with homogeneous socio-demographic and economic

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136  A. K. Mohanty

characteristics. It may be noted that, generally, in western studies, bilingual

and monolingual samples differ in their cultural and socioeconomic status
backgrounds, confounding the effects of bilingualism with cultural differences.
Our studies, which included different samples of schooled (Grades I to X) and
unschooled groups in the age range of 6 to 16, showed that bilingual children
performed better than their monolingual counterparts in various measures
assessing cognitive/intellectual development, metalinguistic ability, and aca-
demic achievement (of schooled children). The Kond studies show that chil-
dren, growing up as Kui-Oriya bilinguals in a social milieu in which their
indigenous language has been maintained in a stable pattern of contact bilin-
gualism, have a clear cognitive advantage over their Oriya monolingual coun-
terparts in areas where Kui has been lost as a result of language shift. The
studies also show that the positive relationship between bilingualism and
cognitive/academic performance can be explained in a contextual metacogni-
tion model (Mohanty 1994, 2003a) of bilingualism and cognition. This model
suggests that, in a multilingual society, bilingualism is supported by its plural-
istic norms and early language socialization. Further, bilingual/multilingual
development and the communicative challenge posed by a complex linguistic
environment together exert positive influences on children’s cognitive, meta-
linguistic and metacognitive skills with positive impact on their intellectual
and academic performance.
Evidence from our sociolinguistic surveys (Mohanty 1987, reported in Mo-
hanty 1994; Mohanty and Parida 1993) among Kond and non-tribal adult vil-
lagers from Kui-Oriya bilingual and Oriya monolingual regions also shows
that bilingualism promotes the social integration of contact communities. In
terms of attitudes towards the maintenance of the language and culture of the
in-group and out-group, the inter-group relationship between the bilingual
communities in contact was integration-oriented, whereas, the relationship
between tribal and non-tribal monolingual communities in contact was
assimilation-oriented for the tribals and segregation-oriented for the non-
tribals. Thus, language contact situations with stable patterns of multiple lan-
guage use are characterized by positive inter-group relationship. The findings
of the Kond studies question the common perception of linguistic h­eterogeneity
as divisive and multilingualism as a cognitive burden. These findings are also
supported in a number of other studies in different cultural contexts:

There is now sound evidence from a variety of cultural settings supporting the positive
role of bilingualism in cognitive development, which can be attributed to the metalin-
guistic and metacognitive advantage of bilinguals and to the social context of bilin­
gualism particularly in multilingual countries. As new findings from a number of differ-
ent societies accumulate, bilingualism has come to be viewed as a positive social force
promoting adaptive cultural relationship, pluralism and better integration. These find-

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 Languages, inequality and marginalization  137

ings have emphasized a fundamental distinction between dominant monolingual coun-

tries and the multilingual ones in terms of the very nature of bilingualism and its conse-
quences. (Mohanty and Perregaux 1997: 246)

3. Languages, power and inequality: the other side of multilingualism

The positive maintenance norms and other positive features of multilingualism

in India seem to increase chances of survival but they do not ensure equality of
status, power and opportunities for the languages. In a stable and egalitarian
form of multilingualism, maintenance of languages and cultures is not just a
matter of development of minority languages; it should be viewed as a process
of total enrichment of the multicultural and multilingual mosaic, including the
majority languages. In other words, processes of language maintenance should
be associated with empowerment of languages that begins with the recognition
of the inherent equality and sufficiency of all languages. Languages do differ
in their form and structure, but, in the cultural spheres of their use, they are all
equally functional in serving the required expressive functions.

The difference in certain aspects of languages such as their complexity, ability to ex-
press specific experiences and the size of their vocabulary etc are only superficial dif-
ferences based on conventions and functional requirements; no language is inherently
deficient, illogical or primitive. (Mohanty 1990c: 4)

No language creates any disability — cognitive or otherwise. Disabilities or

disadvantages often associated with minor languages are socially constructed
based on the unequal treatment of languages. The speakers of minor and indig-
enous languages in India are multiply disadvantaged; as a group they are
mostly poor, belonging to rural and backward areas sharing many features of
disadvantage. This contributes to the association of these languages with pow-
erlessness and insufficiency.
Linguistic inequality is institutionalized in India via the constitutional and
statutory recognition of some of the languages. As pointed out earlier, only 22
languages are recognized as official languages, listed as such in the VIIIth
schedule of the Constitution of India, and English is recognized as an associate
official language. In the listing of languages based on Census returns, a large
number of mother tongues are grouped under the 22 scheduled languages and
out of the remaining mother tongues as many as 1957, each with less than
10,000 speakers, are grouped under “other mother tongues” category. The
speakers of the “other mother tongues” constitute nearly 1 percent of the popu-
lation, rendered powerless in the numbers game. The discrimination against
languages is evident in many other spheres of social, economic, political and

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138  A. K. Mohanty

educational activities. While the dominant languages are privileged as the of-
ficial languages in the states, languages of laws and statutes, trade and com-
merce and languages specifically recognized for various purposes such as
literary awards, many others are deprived of similar recognition. The use of
languages in education, which is crucial to language planning and maintenance
(Fishman 1991), is a major indicator of institutionalized linguistic discrimina-
tion. Apart from English and the 22 constitutionally recognized official lan-
guages, very few of the other languages find a place in school curriculum either
as languages of teaching or as school subjects. In fact, as will be discussed later
in this paper, the number of languages in schools in India has been declining
over the years, down to nearly half of what it was in 1970. The tribal and other
minority languages have no place in education and the children who speak
these languages, when they enter schools, are forced into submersion educa-
tion in dominant languages, with a subtractive effect on their mother tongue.

3.1. Anti-predatory strategies and marginalization of dominated languages

In India, while many languages co-exist and are maintained, many are also
victims of discrimination, social and political neglect and various forms of
deprivation. Some of the Indian languages are privileged with access to power
and resources and others are marginalized and disadvantaged. There is a wide
gap between the statuses of languages and, therefore, Indian multilingualism
has been described as a “multilingualism of the unequals” (Mohanty 2004,
2006) in which languages are clearly associated with a hierarchy of power and
privileges. Even when languages are maintained in such a hierarchical multi-
lingualism, such maintenance is not without its cost. Language maintenance in
the hierarchical multilingualism in India involves marginalization, domain
shrinkage, identity crisis, deprivation of freedom and capability, educational
failure (due to inadequate home language development and forced submersion
in majority language schools), and poverty. Domain shrinkage and marginal-
ization of languages to less resourceful areas as opposed to areas of greater
opportunity (such as market place, legal/official domains, education, signifi-
cant inter-group communication) are typical of the languages that survive de-
spite the powerful presence of more dominant languages. The greater i­ncidence
of “natural” bilingualism among the weaker and disadvantaged communities,
such as the tribal communities, is perhaps an indispensable strategy for sur-
vival, ensuring functioning with little conflict in the face of shift pressures and
socio-economic onslaught. Such survival strategies of dominated languages in
a hierarchical power structure have been called “anti-predatory strategies”.
When animals of subordinate species are threatened by more powerful
predators, they engage in some anti-predatory behaviours to enhance their

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 Languages, inequality and marginalization  139

chances of survival. Such behaviours usually involve retreating to areas of

lesser access and visibility and low resources. A similar pattern is quite evi-
dent in the maintenance of minor and tribal languages in contact with major
languages in India. In face of pressure from dominant contact languages,
these languages withdraw into domains of lesser socio-economic power and
significance and their speakers usually adapt a form of bilingualism in which
the tribal/minority languages are invariably restricted to domains of home
and in-group communication and other less significant domains. These lan-
guages are pushed out of domains of power, such as education, official and
formal use, trade and commerce, which are taken over by the dominant con-
tact languages. (Mohanty 2006: 270)

Owing to such anti-predatory strategies, which the dominated language com-

munities are forced to adopt as a survival technique, rapid language shift is
averted. However, clearly, dominated languages are marginalized with consid-
erable domain shrinkage, and are barely maintained in the domains of home
and close in-group communication, with signs of declining intergenerational
transmission. These languages become impoverished with restricted functions
and limited scope for development. In this process, many tribal languages in
India have been pushed out of public domains of social and economic signifi-
cance for the communities, such as the weekly village market. For example, as
Mohanty et al. (2009: 278–291) note, during the early 1980s the Kond women
of Phulbani (now called Kandhamal) District of Orissa who brought their
household produce for sale in the village markets spoke their Kui language and
used traditional notions of weights and measures for all commercial transac-
tions. They had the better of the bargain with the non-tribal customers with
limited or no knowledge of Kui. Over the last two decades, Kui has been
pushed out of the village markets and the Kond women have been deprived of
their economic power of bargaining in market transactions. Similarly, Panda
(2004, 2007) observes that the use of the Saora language and number system
in market transactions that empowered the people of the Saora tribe in Gajapati
district of Orissa is on the decline. When languages are kept out of significant
domains of use, the indigenous knowledge systems are lost and their speakers
weakened.
Large-scale social neglect and discrimination have led to loss of linguistic
diversity and impoverishment of languages in the world. Exclusion of lan-
guages from domains of power, official recognition, legal and statutory use,
trade, commerce and education, severely restricts the chances of their develop-
ment and survival. Social and educational neglect strip languages of their in-
strumental vitality and contribute to their weakness. Such weakness of domi-
nated languages is often cited to justify further neglect that continues to make
them weaker in a vicious circle of language disadvantage (Mohanty et al. 2009:

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140  A. K. Mohanty

278–291). While the processes of language shift in situations of contact in

India may be less visible and slow, languages are marginalized and impover-
ished in the vicious circle of neglect and resultant weakness. Multiple lan-
guages co-exist in the Indian multilingual mosaic but only few are languages
of power and privilege; the rest are marginalized and weakened in the hierar-
chical power relationship between languages. With English as the dominant
language in post-colonial India, as in South Asia and other parts of the world,
the linguistic hierarchy has created major gaps or linguistic divides in society,
which can be seen in terms of a double divide between English and major lan-
guages and between major languages and the indigenous and tribal minority
(ITM) languages.

4. The double divide and linguistic hierarchy

With a dominant presence of English, all multilingual societies in South Asia

characteristically show signs of a hierarchical multilingualism with English
(and, in some cases, a major national language) at the top of the hierarchy, with
other major languages in the middle rungs and with ITM languages at the bot-
tom. In such a condition of linguistic double divide, the languages in the higher
levels push the lower-level languages out of significant public domains in a
hierarchical pecking order. In this process, there is progressive domain shrink-
age for most languages in favor of the higher-level languages and the rate of
domain loss and marginalization is much higher for the ITM languages at the
bottom of the three-tiered hierarchy. The linguistic double divide in the hierar-
chical power structure of languages leads to deprivation and impoverishment
of languages, threats of language shift, and endangerment and identity crises
for the ITM languages. This is certainly true of South Asian countries, which
are typically characterized by multilingual social realities and monolingual
state practices. Linguistic minorities and speakers of marginalized and domi-
nated languages in these societies seem to be adopting various strategies of
negotiation and assertion of their identities. In India, English is the language of
power, and Hindi and other major languages dominate the ITM languages in
the states. This has led to a struggle on the part of some of the ITM language
communities for recognition and revitalization of their languages. A constitu-
tional amendment in December 2003 granted official status to Bodo and San-
tali following a long period of language movement activity and political lobby-
ing; this is the first time since the promulgation of the Constitution of India in
1950 that any tribal language has been regognized as an official language. In
Nepal, English and Nepali are the dominant languages in all spheres of official
and educational use and nearly 100 other dominated languages are beginning

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 Languages, inequality and marginalization  141

to assert themselves through organized political movements under the nation’s

new democratic régime. In Pakistan, as Rahman (1998) observes, out of the
three official languages (English, Urdu and Sindhi), English is the language of
power, Urdu is the language of Pakistani nationalism, and most of the 72 lan-
guages are clamoring for recognition through several ethno-linguistic move-
ments. Over 39 languages in Bangladesh, including many tribal languages, are
in search of their identity vis-à-vis Bengali (which is the only official language)
and English. Similarly, the place of nearly 29 languages of the indigenous
communities in relation to Dzongkha, the major state language, and English is
being debated for Bhutan’s language and education policy. A dominant pres-
ence of English with rhetorical support to indigenous and minority languages
as symbols of national identities, is typical of all South Asian countries. Practi-
cally English has established itself as the language of power in South Asian
societies, often benefiting from internal conflicts between competing linguistic
claims. For example, conflicts between Hindi and Tamil as well as other South
Indian languages in India, and between the speakers of Sinhala and Tamil in Sri
Lanka have facilitated the dominant role of English. The formation of Bangla-
desh as a separate nation followed the Bengali language movement resisting
the dominance of Urdu; but internal power dynamics and conflicting interests
have resulted in a dominant place for English. In Pakistan, English is promoted
as a language of power although Urdu (as well as Islam) is projected as a
­symbol of national integration. With English as the language of power and
privileges, particularly in the new global economy, the ITM languages in South
Asia are pushed to the periphery. In spite of widespread multilingualism, South
Asian societies are characterized by a typically hierarchical relationship be-
tween languages which can be seen as a double divide between English at the
top of the three-tiered hierarchy, the mass language(s) of the majority at the
middle rungs and the marginalized indigenous and minority languages — often
stigmatized as dialects — at the bottom.
The Indian socio-linguistic scenario is affected, on one hand, by the English-
regional majority language divide or what Ramanathan (2005a, 2005b) calls
the English-Vernacular divide and, on the other, by the Vernacular-Minority 2 /
Indigenous Language divide (which will be called Vernacular-Other divide,
hereafter). This double divide is reflected in the very nature of multilingualism,
which according to Annamalai (2001: 35) is “bifocal, existing both at the mass
level and the elite level”. Elite level multilingualism involves English as an
additional language, mostly acquired through formal schooling, whereas mass
multilingualism is related to grass-roots level natural or informal bilingualism,
mostly acquired through language contact. Thus, the distribution of bilin­
gualism with and without English in the multilingual mosaic of India shows
the hierarchy across the linguistic double divides. This hierarchy also involves
a pecking order in which English relegates Hindi and other major languages

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142  A. K. Mohanty

(of the states in India) to positions of lesser significance and power, while
the state majority languages push other languages out of the major domains of
use.
The double divide is variously negotiated, resisted and contested in society
through individual and collective identity strategies. The complex identity pro-
cesses have contributed to the rising demand for English and English-medium
schooling, Anglicization of Indian languages and progressive domain shrink-
age of other languages in favor of English, and, at the same time, to many in-
stances of movements agitating for the removal of English (and Hindi, in some
parts of the country) and to the Sanskritization of languages. The hierarchical
relationship of languages has affected the identity strategies of the speakers of
dominated and indigenous languages. Collective identity strategies have led, in
some cases, to language movements, and to the assertive maintenance and re-
vitalization of languages (such as Bodo and Santali). In others, individual iden-
tity strategies of the speakers of indigenous languages in India have resulted in
passive acceptance of the dominance of major languages and a dissociation
between instrumental and integrative functions of language (Mohanty 2004).
Such dissociation is evident from their endorsement of the major languages for
children’s education and for use in domains of economic significance and of
groups’ own native languages for in-group identity and culture. Such divergent
identity strategies can be seen as leading to instances of linguistic identity
without language (for example, the case of Kui3 linguistic identity applying to
monolingual Konds using the Oriya language) and language without identity
(for example, many of the upper-class English-educated Bhojpuri speakers do
not identify with Bhojpuri4). Use of indigenous and vernacular languages is
often associated with shame and denial of proficiency in these languages.
These are some indications of how the hierarchical linguistic structure and the
double divide in the Indian society are variously negotiated through complex
social-psychological processes (Mohanty 1991, 2004). Studies of multilingual
socialization in India (Bujorbarua 2006; Mohanty et al. 1999) show that chil-
dren in India develop an early awareness of the double divide and the social
norms of preference among the languages in the hierarchy. For example, in
discussing the stages of multilingual socialization, Mohanty et al. (1999) show
that 7- to 9-year-old children in India have a clear awareness of the higher so-
cial status of English vis-à-vis their own mother tongues and that schools do
contribute to the development of such early awareness. Bujorborua’s (2006)
study of the multilingual socialization of Assamese children shows that chil-
dren develop an early preference for using English over Assamese. She also
shows that parental language socialization strategies target transmission of the
socio-linguistic hierarchy of languages and the preference for English over As-
samese, Hindi and other languages. These studies show how the relationship
between language and power and the hierarchy of preferences for languages

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 Languages, inequality and marginalization  143

are socially constructed and legitimated through the processes of language

socialization.
The double divide has far-reaching implications for the future of multi­
lingualism in India. It affects the processes of language change, marginaliza-
tion, shift and maintenance and the relationship between languages and their
speakers. The languages across the double divide — English, the vernaculars
and ITM languages — show quantum differences in their ethno-linguistic vi-
tality and access to power and privileges in Indian society. This is quite evident
in language policy and practice in education in India.

4.1. Languages and education in India: some implications of the double

divide

The role of languages in education in India reflects the double divide in the
multilingual hierarchy. At all levels of education, the dominance of English is
increasingly evident. Constitutional provisions and several policy documents
(see Mohanty 2006, 2008a, for discussion) accept the principle of education in
children’s mother tongue and in 1957 the three-language formula (TLF) was
floated by the government of India to deal with the place of mother tongues,
regional languages and Hindi, and English in school education in India. The
TLF recommended use of regional language or mother tongue as the first
teaching-language to be followed by the teaching of Hindi or regional lan-
guages and English. The distinction between regional language and mother
tongue was not clear and it formalized the imposition of the majority state
languages as media of school education on the minority and tribal language
children in forced submersion models of schooling. The TLF was modified in
1967 making the teaching of Hindi optional and suggesting the use of tribal
languages as media of early schooling for tribal children. However, such pro­
visions in the TLF and several other policy documents “mostly remained
untranslated into practice” (Mohanty 2006: 274). Subsequently, the TLF was
modified on several occasions; “different versions were applied depending on
how the formula was interpreted in various states and school systems. Despite
such variations, English became the most common second language subject in
all the states, followed by either Hindi or Sanskrit as the third language sub-
ject” (Mohanty 2006: 274). The TLF did not provide a language-in-education
policy. Through several modifications, it sought to balance between English,
Hindi and regional languages (vernaculars) and mother tongues (of the tribal
and minority groups) and, quite clearly, it failed to do so. Further, in the ab-
sence of a uniform school system and the increasingly dominant presence of
private schools, most of which are English-medium schools, the language
scenario in Indian education continues to be chaotic. However, two trends are

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144  A. K. Mohanty

quite visible: English is rapidly gaining in significance in school education all

over the country, directly undermining the role of Hindi and other vernacular
languages, and there is a steady decline in the number of mother tongues in
schools in India along with a negligible presence of tribal languages.
Analysis of the number of languages used in schools in India as languages
of teaching and as school subjects shows a sharp decline over the years (Mo-
hanty 2008a). This number declined from 81 in 1970 to 41 in 1998. At present,
the number of languages taught or used as media of instruction (MI) is 31 in
primary level (Grades I to V), 25 in Grades VI and VII, 21 in Grades VIII to X,
and 18 in higher secondary levels (Grades XI and XII). English is not only
present in all levels of education, but its presence in very early years of school-
ing is increasing rapidly. The use of tribal languages as MI is negligible (Mo-
hanty 2008b); out of over 100 tribal languages, only 3 to 4 are used regularly
as languages of teaching (Jhingran 2005); less than 1% of the tribal mother
tongue children have any opportunity for education through the medium of
their mother tongues. Thus, the “mismatch between school language and home
language and the subtractive language development triggered by the forced
submersion are major educational issues” (Mohanty 2006: 275).
In contrast to the tribal and minority languages, English is used as a lan-
guage of teaching all over India at all levels of education. Higher education,
technical education and university-level teaching are almost exclusively in
English. English is taught at least as a compulsory school subject by Grade 4
in all the states and in Grade I in most states in India. In fact, English has re-
placed Hindi as the most pervasively used language in schools. There are gross
differences in the nature of the place of English in different schools in India. In
almost all private schools, English is the MI or language of teaching, whereas
it is taught mostly as a compulsory school subject from the early primary
grades in the government schools.5 Almost all government schools, with a few
exceptions, use Hindi and other regional majority languages (vernaculars) as
media of instruction (MI) for children with a vernacular MT. The ITM children
are also forced to attend such schools where the MI is not their MT. The private
English medium (EM) schools in India are quite heterogeneous in terms of
their quality and cost and the socioeconomic strata to which they cater (Mo-
hanty 2006). As pointed out earlier, education in English, as the elitist language
of power and access to economic resources, is most sought after by the parents
in India. Therefore, only those who cannot afford English-medium schools for
their children opt for vernacular MT medium schools, and poor parents from
tribal and minority mother tongues have no choice but to send their children to
vernacular-medium (VM) government schools. Thus, in terms of the linguistic
double divide and the socioeconomic stratification in society, schools in India
can be broadly categorized into five levels based on the annual cost of school-
ing (to the parents) and the medium of instruction:

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 Languages, inequality and marginalization  145

i. V ery exclusive elitist EM residential schools (nearly 1,000,000 INR [In-

dian Rupees]);
ii. High-cost EM schools for the privileged class (100,000 to 300,000 INR);
iii. Low-cost EM schools for the less privileged social class (5,000 to 20,000
INR);
iv. No-cost VM government schools for the regional majority language
groups who cannot afford EM schools;
v. No-cost VM government schools for the ITM language groups who can-
not afford EM schools.

The quality of the schools in these five categories is closely proportionate to

the cost to the parents. The children in the last two categories are disadvan-
taged since they come from low socioeconomic strata and are subjected to a
low quality of schooling. However, the ITM children in VM government
schools are most disadvantaged with poor quality schooling in a language that
is not their MT. As has been discussed earlier, exclusion of the mother tongues
from schools for indigenous tribal minority children has negative consequences
for their education and capability development and contributes to their poverty
(Mohanty 2008b). In fact, the organization of public and private schools in
India can be understood from the perspective of the linguistic double divide in
the society. The societal linguistic hierarchy — the elitist and privileged posi-
tion of English, the relative advantages of the vernaculars and the dominated
and disadvantaged status of the ITM languages — is directly related to the
manner in which schools are socially situated. This becomes quite clear from
examination of the processes of negotiation of the double divide in different
types of schools in India. We will now briefly focus on some recent analysis of
such processes.

4.1.1.  The double divide and school practices in India: some observations.
In view of the rising demand for EM schools, a large number of low-cost (and
low-quality) schools have sprung up all over the country as commercial ven-
tures offering education in English for aspiring parents from the lower socio-
economic strata. School practices and classroom teaching are quite diverse
even across the EM schools. As Ramanathan (2005b) observes, these EM
schools socialize students to divergent models of English literacy. Generally,
the elite and upper class schools offer better quality (and high-cost) schooling
compared to the other EM schools and their school practices are distinctly
Anglicized and westernized. Use of languages other than English in the school
premises is not allowed, and classroom transactions are exclusively in English.
The home environment and early socialization of the pupils (Mohanty et al.
1999) in these schools support learning of English and provide the attitudinal
readiness for such learning. The teachers in these schools are competent in

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146  A. K. Mohanty

English and usually come from middle and upper economic strata. The low-
cost EM schools for children from economically less privileged social class
families, in contrast, respond to the need for negotiation between the aspired
English identity and the lack of socio-cultural support for English in the early
socialization of the children. Typically, these schools espouse cosmetic Angli-
cization, insisting on western school uniform (usually with a tie and shoes as
in upper class EM schools) for the pupils and other behavioral routines such as
ritualistic recitation of prayers and greeting routines in English. The regional
majority languages such as Hindi or Oriya and children’s mother tongues (such
as tribal languages like Kui and Saora) are freely used in classroom teaching of
various school subjects including English (Mohanty et al. 2010), and c­lassrooms
language transactions in English are nativized and hybridized (Ramanathan
2005a). Mohanty et al. (2010) show that the EM schools for the less privileged
social class correspond to inadequate home support for children’s learning of
school subjects in English by use of low cost, poor quality and “easy” text
books and also by adapting the classroom assessment tests in such a way as to
emphasize “correct single word answers” in place of elaborate written answers.
Ramanathan (2005a) discusses classroom pedagogic practices of negotiation
of the English-Vernacular divide in different types of Gujarati/Vernacular-
medium and English-medium educational institutions in Gujarat, India. On the
basis of their observations of classroom transactions in tribal areas in Orissa,
India and in an English-medium charity school in Delhi for children from
lower middle-class families, Mohanty et al. (2010) show how the more com-
plex English-Vernacular and Vernacular-Other double divide is variously ad-
dressed in the early school years by teachers and school-level educational ad-
ministrators (including school Headmasters/Principals and school supervisors/
inspectors). The teaching practices in these schools show that the hierarchical
relationship between languages — English, the vernacular languages (e.g.,
Hindi or Oriya) and the indigenous languages (e.g., Kui) — and the linguistic
double divide (which acts as a hurdle to children’s classroom learning of En­
glish and regional majority languages), are accepted at one level and strategi-
cally contested at another. As Mohanty et al. (2010) show, this leads to unex-
pected classroom practices like teaching English in Hindi or Oriya and strategic
informal use of tribal mother tongues in teaching language subjects. They also
show that, in the teaching of a vernacular language like Oriya to tribal children
with a tribal language MT (Kui or Saora), teachers in VM government schools
in the tribal areas in Orissa adapt various strategies to facilitate learning a non-
MT school language. These strategies are intended to scaffold the learning of
the vernacular language by various means, including frequent use of the tribal
MT and modifying the learning targets and assessment procedures in such a
way as to facilitate children’s transition from MT to the vernacular language of
school instruction.

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 Languages, inequality and marginalization  147

The preceding observations on school practices show that the different types
of schools in India variously respond to the need to scaffold the school learning
of pupils in their efforts to circumvent the English-Vernacular and Vernacular-
Other language divide. It must be noted that the double divide is much more
than a simple linguistic divide abstracted from the hierarchical relationship
between languages in a multilingual society. It is deeply rooted in the social
macrostructure in which the languages, social classes and the schools are em-
bedded. For example, the social class difference in India is the cause as well as
consequence of the power of English in instilling learning aspirations among
students in the lower social strata. The meaning and implications of English,
vernacular languages and mother tongues are socially constructed and vary
across different social classes. Such differences are rooted in the processes of
socialization and availability of material, social and family support for differ-
ent languages, which differ from one social class to another. As cumulative
effects of such differences, children are already located at different points in
the double divide when they enter formal schools (which, in turn, are also
similarly located). The children from the privileged class are already located
at the other side of the divide, with early advantages in respect of English
and, therefore, they are not required to deal with challenges of the double di-
vide. The less privileged are the ones who need to negotiate the challenges
of the linguistic double divide in the form of English, which may be alien to
their early experience. The challenge of the double divide is most formidable
for the ITM children in schools, who need to negotiate simultaneously the
English-Vernacular and the Vernacular-Other language divide. They struggle
not only to learn the vernacular language of the school with no or little profi-
ciency in the same but also to learn an alien language like English twice re-
moved from their social reality and early experience. The language disadvan-
tage of tribal children in forced submersion schools using a vernacular-language
medium of teaching is a major factor in poor school learning, high exclusion
rates, large scale school failure, capability deprivation and poverty among
tribal mother tongue s­peakers in India (see Mohanty [2008b] for an elaborate
discussion).

4.2. Overcoming the language barrier: multilingual education in India

The system of education in India has not responded to the challenges of its
multilingual ethos (Mohanty 2008b). Multiple languages complement each
other in meeting the communicative needs of people and, hence, education
must necessarily foster multilingual proficiency in the languages of functional
significance at different levels of the Indian society — MT, languages for

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148  A. K. Mohanty

regional and national level communication and international language of wider

communication. Thus, education for the major language communities with a
vernacular language as their MT needs to develop competence in at least
two to three languages such as Bengali, Hindi and English. Education for the
ITM language communities, on the other hand, must involve three to four lan-
guages including, for example, a tribal language MT, major languages like
Hindi and Bengali, and English as an international language of wider com­
munication. However, analysis of the programs of school education in India
shows that they offer only nominal forms of multilingual education (Mohanty
2006, 2008a). They do not support the weaker languages; nor do they develop
multilingual proficiency. Multilingual education (MLE) involves use of two
or more languages as languages of teaching (MI) in subjects other than the
languages themselves (Anderson and Boyer 1978) and it develops high levels
of multilingual proficiency and multiliteracy (Mohanty, Skutnabb-Kangas,
Panda and Phillipson 2009). International experience with MLE and research
evidence show that the process of education for the development of multi­
lingual proficiency may start with the development of proficiency in MT as
the language of teaching (MI) for at least six to eight years of schooling and
may gradually develop other languages through their systematic use as MI
(Mohanty, Skutnabb-Kangas, Panda and Phillipson 2009; Skutnabb-Kangas
and Mohanty 2009). Such programs of MLE is particularly beneficial for
the ITM children who are denied the choice of development of their MT and
multilingual proficiency in the current system of education in India in which
tribal and other ITM children are forced to go through subtractive forms of
submersion education in a non-MT language (Mohanty 2006, 2008b). In recent
years some programs of MLE have started in India to deal with the problem of
language disadvantage of tribal children facing the formidable double divide.
The language disadvantage of tribal children in dominant language schools
is a major factor in their educational failure. This realization led to sporadic
efforts in India to try out various models of mother tongue-based education for
tribal children (Mohanty 1989, 2006). The early attempts were transitional pro-
grams of bilingual education to facilitate smooth transition from the tribal MT
to vernacular language of schooling. These government programs lacked any
theoretical framework and were dropped without any systematic evaluation.
Only recently, some states have started structured programs of mother tongue-
based MLE for tribal MT children. Mother tongue-based MLE started in
Andhra Pradesh in the year 2004 in eight tribal MTs for children in 240 schools
and in Orissa in 2006 in ten tribal MTs in 195 schools (see Mohanty at al.
[2009: 278–291] for details of these programs). These programs involve use of
MT as the language of teaching and early literacy instruction for the first three
to five years in primary level schooling. The state majority language (L2),
Telugu in Andhra Pradesh and Oriya in Orissa, is introduced as a language

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 Languages, inequality and marginalization  149

subject for the development of oral communicative skills in the second year
and for reading and writing skills in the third year of schooling. The state lan-
guage is used as a language of teaching from the fourth year and the program
envisages the MLE children joining regular school programs in the majority
language of the states (Telugu/Oriya) from the sixth year onwards. The tribal
languages in these programs are written in the script6 of the state language with
some modifications wherever necessary. The teachers in the MLE programs
are taken from the language community and speak the target tribal language.
The programs follow the common school curriculum of the states but attempt
to integrate the cultural knowledge system of the tribal language community in
developing the textbooks and other curricular materials. In Orissa, a special
intervention program (Panda and Mohanty 2009) called MLE Plus (MLE+) is
implemented in eight of the government MLE schools in two tribal languages
— Kui and Saora. This program has a special focus on cultural pedagogy that
emphasizes culture and community based approach to children’s collaborative
classroom learning and development of cultural identity. Several evaluations
of the MLE and MLE+ programs have shown positive effects on children’s
classroom achievement, school attendance and participation, parental satisfac-
tion and community involvement (Mohanty et al. 2009: 278–291; Panda and
Mohanty 2009). Evidently, the experimental MLE programs in India provide
better quality education for the tribal children compared to the traditional pro-
grams of submersion education in the state majority language, which is not
their MT. However, the burden of the linguistic double divide remains a major
issue even in these relatively small-scale experimental programs, which are
under pressure to accommodate the major state language, English and Hindi at
early stages of primary education. Because of this pressure, MLE programs not
only bring in the state language (L2), English and Hindi into the teaching pro-
gram by the second, third and fifth years, respectively, but also plan to discon-
tinue use of the MT from the sixth year onwards. This approach to transition
from the MT to vernaculars and English goes against the established research
findings in respect of MLE. Research clearly shows that late-exit programs of
MLE, which continue with MT as the language of teaching for six to eight
years, are more effective than early-exit programs and that the longer the MT
is continued as the language of teaching the better is the development of profi-
ciency in other languages including English (Skutnabb-Kangas and Mohanty
2009). Further, “while learning of the state majority language as also Hindi
is supported by greater degree of exposure to these languages through their
presence in several social and public domains such as market place use, inter-
group communication and popular media, the same cannot be said for English
in rural areas” (Mohanty et al. 2009: 289). Thus, the problem of the double
divide remains a formidable challenge for education of the tribal children in
India.

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150  A. K. Mohanty

5. Conclusion

Languages do make us human. But used as instruments of discrimination, sub-

jugation, assimilation and homogenization, languages are also dehumanizing.
In any society, when some languages empower their speakers, giving them
better access to resources, the speakers of other languages are necessarily dis-
advantaged. Marginalization and shift of languages occur not because the
languages in question are inherently weak, but because, in the hierarchical
positioning of languages in a vicious circle of language disadvantage, they are
weakened systematically and cumulatively by prolonged exclusion from so-
cially and economically significant domains including education. Multilin-
gualism, as in India, is and can be a social and individual resource. However,
when multilingualism is associated with inequality, it privileges few and disad-
vantages many. In a hierarchical pecking order of multilingualism, the privi-
leged language of the elites pushes the less privileged languages into domains
of lesser significance. The less privileged languages, in turn, push the disad-
vantaged ones into invisibility and marginalization in a defensive process of
anti-predatory reactions. Indian multilingualism shows definite signs of such
inequality, which is dehumanizing, since it leads to capability deprivation and
poverty for the marginalized language communities such as the tribal peoples.
Absence of an effective and consistent policy framework for languages in so-
ciety and education perpetuates the inequality.
It has been argued in this paper that Indian multilingualism can be under-
stood as a system characterized by a double divide between English, the ver-
naculars or the regional dominant languages and the languages of the in­
digenous and tribal minorities. The processes of multilingual socialization,
collective and individual identity strategies and a host of other social-
psychological and sociolinguistic phenomena such as intergroup relations in
Indian multilingualism can be viewed as being deeply related to the double
divide. The linguistic double divide is simultaneously a phenomenon embed-
ded in the social macrostructure and one that affects the same. For example, the
system of private and government schooling in India is organized as following
from and leading to the linguistic double divide. In order to understand how
schools in India make and unmake the society, one needs to appreciate this
bidirectional relationship between the linguistic double divide and the system
as well as the processes of schooling. Negotiation of linguistic identities in
society and in educational institutions can be viewed as attempts at different
levels to overcome the language barriers across the double divide. The new
experimental programs of mother tongue-based multilingual education in I­ndia
are attempts at helping the tribal children deal effectively with the problem of
the double divide. However, the structuring of these programs and positioning
of languages in them are saddled by the challenges of the societal and linguis-

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 Languages, inequality and marginalization  151

tic double divide. The future of India’s multilingualism and linguistic diversity
lies in how the formidable problem of the double divide is addressed.

Jawaharlal Nehru University

Correspondence address: [email protected]

Notes

1. The Indigenous or aboriginal communities in India are officially called ‘tribes’ (ādivāsi ) and
are listed as ‘scheduled tribes’ which are identified on the basis of ‘distinct culture and lan-
guage’, ‘geographical isolation’, ‘primitive traits’, ‘economic backwardness’, and ‘limited
contact with the out groups’ and also, sometimes, on political considerations. The Anthropo-
logical Survey of India, in its People of India project, has identified 635 tribal communities of
which 573 are so far officially notified as Scheduled Tribes. Here the term ‘tribe’ (rather than
‘Indigenous peoples’) is used specifically in the Indian context in its formal/official and neu-
tral sense.
2. It should be noted that no language is a national majority language in India. Speakers of Hindi,
which make up the largest linguistic group, constitute 41.03% of the national population.
Bengali, the next largest group has only 8.11% share of the population.
3. Kui is the indigenous language of the Kond tribe in Kandhamal District of Orissa. In parts of
the district, there has been a shift of Kui in favor of Oriya, the state dominant language. The
Oriya monolingual Konds in these parts of Kandhamal still identify with Kui language calling
themselves “Kui people”.
4. Upper class Bhojpuri speakers often assume a superordinate identity as Hindi speakers. Sriv-
astava (1989) also noted that migrant Bhojpuri workers in Maharashtra show a language shift
towards Hindi.
5. In many states in India, particularly in the northeast region, government schools are also En­
glish medium schools. Some states in India (e.g., Andhra Pradesh) are planning to open par­
allel sections in the same schools with English or regional majority (vernacular) language as
language of teaching.
6. Tribal languages in India do not have any exclusive script system and are usually written in
the script of either the dominant regional language or another major language. But, in recent
years, some tribal languages, such as Santali, have developed their own writing system.

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