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Chhattisgarhi (छत्तिसगढ़ी) is an Indo-Aryan language spoken in the Indian state of Chhattisgarh which has approximately 11.5 million speakers.

The speakers are concentrated in the Indian state of Chhattisgarh and in adjacent areas of Madhya Pradesh, Orissa, and Bihar.

Chhattisgarhi cultural and political movements, with origins going back to the 1920s, affirmed Chhattisgarhi cultural and linguistic identity and sought greater autonomy within India. This came about in 2000 when 16 districts of the state of Madhya Pradesh became the new state of Chhattisgarh.

Classification

Chhattisgarhi is most closely related to Bagheli and Awadhi (Avadhi), and these languages are classified in the East Central Zone of the Indo-Aryan languages, the Indian branch of the Indo-European language family.

According to the Indian Government, Chhattisgarhi is an eastern dialect of Hindi, although it is widely considered by linguists to be distinct enough from Hindi to constitute a separate language. Chhattisgarhi has several identified dialects of its own, in addition to Chhattisgarhi Proper: Baighani, Bhulia, Binjhwari, Kalanga, Kavardi, Khairagarhi, Sadri Korwa, and Surgujia.

Writing

Chhattisgarhi, like Hindi, is written using the Devanagari script.

Grammar

Like Hindi, Chhattisgarhi has postpositions instead of prepositions, e.g. -kaa "of." However, unlike Hindi, Chhattisgarhi has no oblique case, so postpositions are simply added to the end of a noun without any change in the noun itself.¹

Sources

• G. A. Zograph: Languages of South Asia, 1960 (translated by G.L. Campbell, 1982), Routledge, London.
• Language entry on Ethnologue

References

1. ^ Grierson, George Abraham. Linguistic Survey of India. 2nd ed., Vol. 6. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 1967-68.

Further reading

• Graber, J. D. Chhattisgarhi primer for adults. Dhamtari, C.P.: The Committee, 1937.
• Kavyopadhyaya, Hira Lal, George Abraham Grierson, and Lochan Prasad Kavya-Vinod. A Grammar of the Chhattisgarhi Dialect of Eastern Hindi. Calcutta: Published under the orders of the local government Central Provinces and Berar, 1921.

See also

• Languages of India
• List of national languages of India
• List of Indian languages by total speakers

External links

• Entry for Chhattisgarhi at Rosetta Project