• There are 121 languages which are spoken by 10,000 or more people in India, which has a population of 121 crore

• The 121 languages are presented in two parts — languages included in the Eighth Schedule of the Indian Constitution, comprising 22 languages and languages not included in the Eighth Schedule, comprising of 99 languages plus the category “total of other languages”, which includes all other languages and mother tongues which returned less than 10,000 speakers each at the all-India level or were not identifiable on the basis of the linguistic information available.
• The number of scheduled languages was 22 at the time of presentation of the 2001. The same 22 languages are maintained in 2011 census also.
• The non-scheduled languages are 99 in 2011 against 100 in 2001. The decrease in the number is due to exclusion of Simte and Persian, which were not returned in sufficient numbers as 2011, and inclusion of Mao, which has returned more than 10,000 speakers at the all-India level at 2011 census.
• Of the total population of India, 96.71 percent have one of the scheduled languages as their mother tongue, the remaining 3.29 per cent is accounted for other languages.

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