EIGHTH SCHEDULE Constitution of India 1949

Article 344 (1) and 351

LANGUAGES

Constitutional provisions relating to Eighth Schedule

The Constitutional provisions relating to the Eighth Schedule occur in articles 344(1) and 351 of the Constitution. Article 344(1) provides for the constitution of a Commission by the President on expiration of five years from the commencement of the Constitution and thereafter at the expiration of ten years from such commencement, which shall consist of a Chairman and such other members representing the different languages specified in the Eighth Schedule to make recommendations to the President for the progressive use of Hindi for official purposes of the Union.

Article 351 of the Constitution provides that it shall be the duty of the Union to promote the spread of the Hindi language to develop it so that it may serve as a medium of expression for all the elements of the composite culture of India and to secure its enrichment by assimilating without interfering with its genius, the forms, style and expressions used in Hindustani and in the other languages of India specified in the Eighth Schedule, and by drawing, wherever necessary or desirable, for its vocabulary, primarily, on Sanskrit and secondarily on other languages.

It would thus appear that the Eighth Schedule was intended to promote the progressing use of Hindi and for the enrichment and promotion of that language.

List of languages in the Eighth Schedule

The Eighth Schedule to the Constitution consists of the following 22 languages
(1) Assamese
(2) Bengali
(3) Gujarati
(4) Hindi
(5) Kannada
(6) Kashmiri
(7) Konkani
(8) Malayalam
(9) Manipuri
(10) Marathi
(11) Nepali
(12) Oriya
(13) Punjabi
(14) Sanskrit
(15) Sindhi
(16) Tamil
(17) Telugu
(18) Urdu
(19) Bodo
(20) Santhali
(21) Maithili
(22) Dogri