India

"Mathematical science was so perfect and astronomical observations so complete that the paths of the sun and the moon were accurately measured. The philosophy of the learned few was perhaps for the first time, firmly allied with the theology of the believing many, and Brahmanism laid down as articles of faith the unity of God, the creation of the world, the immortality of the soul, and the responsibility of man. The remote dwellers upon the Ganges distinctly made known that future life about which Moses is silent or obscure, and that unity and Omnipotence of the Creator which were unknown to the polytheism of the Greek and Roman multitude, and to the dualism of Mithraic legislators, while Vyasa perhaps surpassed Plato in keeping the people tremblingly alive to the punishment which awaited evil deeds.""

"The two foundations of twentieth-century physics—quantum theory and relativity theory—both force us to see the world very much in the way a Hindu, Buddhist … sees it. [...] The scale of this ancient myth is indeed staggering; it has taken the human mind more than two thousand years to come up again with a similar concept."

"No people in the world have ever attained to such a grandeur of thought in ideal conceptions of the Deity and its offspring, MAN, as the Sanscrit metaphysicians and theologians."

"The Indian religious traditions... accepted the concept of non-being on an equal footing with that of being. Like many other Eastern religions, the Indian culture regarded Nothing as a state from which one might have come and to which one might return.. Where Western religious traditions sought to flee from nothingness... a state of non-being was something to be actively sought by Buddhist and Hindus in order to achieve Nirvana: oneness with the Cosmos."

"The logic of the Greeks prevents them having the idea at all and it is to the Indian cultures that we must look to find thinkers who are comfortable with the idea that Nothing might be something."

"Since the 1960s, Western scholarship has focused selectively but intensively on the premodern (or “medieval”) and modern literary traditions in about half a dozen Indian languages, resulting in major works of translation, interpretation, and commentary. A selective roster of scholars would include Gordon Roadarmel, Charlotte Vaudeville, Ronald Stuart McGreggor, John Stratton Hawley, Kathryn Hansen, Peter Gaeffke, Mark Jurgensmeyer, Karine Schomer, Linda Hess, Kenneth Bryant, David Rubin, and Philip Lutgendorf in Hindi; Edward C. Dimock, David Kopf, William Radice, and Clinton B. Seely in Bengali; Ian Raeside, Eleanor Zelliot, Philip Engblom, and Ann Feldhaus in Marathi; George L. Hart, David Shulman, and Norman Cutler in Tamil; David Shulman, Hank Heifetz, and Gene H. Rogair in Telugu; and Frances Pritchett and Carlo Coppola in Urdu."

"The recent five-judge bench Supreme Court judgment in Chebrolu Leela Prasad Rao and Ors v State of AP and Ors, shows us once again how little the 5th Schedule of the Indian constitution which is meant to protect adivasi rights is understood. The reasoning in the judgment – which struck down an Andhra Pradesh government order from 2000 providing 100% reservation for Scheduled Tribe teachers in of the state – moves perilously close to dismantling the entire edifice of the 5th Schedule. [...] Many non-tribals, including lower government officials, have lived for years in tribal areas without feeling the need to learn tribal languages. At the primary level, mutual incomprehension between non-tribal teachers and tribal students hampers the basic education of children. The judges tell us that “It is an obnoxious idea that tribals only should teach the tribals” (para 133), but for far too long, the really obnoxious idea that has pervaded the educational system and is reflected in judgments like this one is that only non-tribals should teach tribals, to “uplift and mainstream” them because “their language and their primitive way of life makes them unfit to put up with the mainstream and to be governed by the s” (para 107)."

"Hindavi was the language from old times; when the Ghurids and Turks arrived [in India], Persian began to be used and every high and low person learned it … As I belong to India, it is only fitting that I talk about it. There is a different, original language in every region of this land. Sindhi, Lahori, Kashmiri, Kibar, Dhaur Samundari, Tilangi, Gujar, Ma'bari, Gauri, the languages of Bangalah, Avadh, Delhi and its environs, all these are Hindavi, i.e., Indian languages, current since the olden days and commonly used for all kinds of speech. There is yet another language that is favoured by all the Brahmins. It is known as Sanskrit since ancient times; common people do not know it, only the Brahmins do, but one single Brahmin cannot comprehend its limits. Like Arabic, Sanskrit has a grammar, rules of syntax, and a literature … Sanskrit is a pearl; it may be inferior to Arabic but is superior to Dari … If I knew it well I would praise my sultan in it also."

"I am not suggesting that Sanskrit be pushed aggressively, but only that the advantage of this great classical language, which is understood by more people in India than Greek and Latin in modern Europe, must be appreciated and utilized. Further, in the Devanagari script, there exists a possible common script for other Indian languages, though one cannot be too optimistic about the practicability of adopting it in view of the tenacious attachment of people to their own particular scripts. Another link language which flourished in India was Persian which in its interplay with Sanskrit and Arabic produced the great modern language, Urdu. Here again, beginning as a court or camp language, it blossomed into a modern tongue of the people, linking India linguistically with the Arab world."

"In his diary, Hsuan Tsang has recorded that India was divided into five divisions or to use his language, there were ‘five Indies': (1) Northern India, (2) Western India, (3) Central India, (4) Eastern India and (5) Southern India and that these five divisions contained 80 kingdoms.... It is true that when Hsuan Tsang came, not only the Punjab but what is now Afghanistan was part of India and further, the people of the Punjab and Afghanistan were either Vedic or Buddhist by religion."

"“It is out of the past that the future has to be moulded; it is the past that becomes the future. Therefore the more the Indians study their past, the more glorious will be their future, and whoever tries to bring the past to the door of everyone is a benefactor of the nation.”"

"“Those who expect from a people like the Hindus a species of composition of precisely the same character as the historical works of Greece and Rome commit the very gregarious error of overlooking the peculiarities which distinguish the natives of India from all other races, and which strongly discriminate their intellectual productions of every kind from those of the West. Their philosophy, their poetry, their architecture, are marked with traits of originality; and the same may be expected to pervade their history, which, like the arts enumerated, took a character from its intimate association with the religion of the people. It must be recollected, moreover,… that the chronicles of all the polished nations of Europe, were, at a much more recent date, as crude, as wild, and as barren, as those of the early Rajputs.” ... “My own animadversions upon the defective condition of the annals of Rajwarra have more than once been checked by a very just remark: ‘When our princes were in exile, driven from hold to hold, and compelled to dwell in the clefts of the mountains, often doubtful whether they would not be forced to abandon the very meal preparing for them, was that a time to think of historical records?’ ”... “If we consider the political changes and convulsions which have happened in Hindustan since Mahmood’s invasion, and the intolerant bigotry of many of his successors, we shall be able to account for the paucity of its national works on history, without being driven to the improbable conclusion, that the Hindus were ignorant of an art which has been cultivated in other countries from almost the earliest ages. Is it to be imagined that a nation so highly civilized as the Hindus, amongst whom the exact sciences flourished in perfection, by whom the fine arts, architecture, sculpture, poetry, music, were not only cultivated, but taught and defined by the nicest and most elaborate rules, were totally unacquainted with the simple art of recording the events of their history, the character of their princes and the acts of their reigns?” [The fact appears to be that] “After eight centuries of galling subjection to conquerors totally ignorant of the classical language of the Hindus; after every capital city had been repeatedly stormed and sacked by barbarous, bigoted, and exasperated foes; it is too much to expect that the literature of the country should not have sustained, in common with other interests, irretrievable losses.”"

"Generally speaking, the men who hitherto have written on the affairs of India, were a set of liars."

"India, as she is, is a problem which can only be read by the light of Indian history. Only by a gradual and loving study of how she came to be, can we grow to understand what the country actually is, what the intention of her evolution, and what her sleeping potentiality may be."

"I can see how what I said then could be misinterpreted. I was talking about history, I was talking about a historical process that had to come. I think India has lived with one major extended event, that began about 1000 AD, the Muslim invasion. It meant the cracking open and partial wrecking of what was a complete cultural, religious world until that invasion. I don't think the people of India have been able to come to terms with that wrecking. I don't think they understand what really happened. It's too painful. And I think this BJP movement and that masjid business is part of a new sense of history, a new idea of what happened. It might be misguided, it might be wrong to misuse it politically, but I think it is part of a historical process. And to simply abuse it as Fascist is to fail to understand why it finds an answer in so many hearts in India. .... It could become that. And that has to be dealt with. But it can only be dealt with if both sides understand very clearly the history of the country. I don't think Hindus understand what Islam means and I don't think the people of Islam have tried to understand Hinduism. The two enormous groups have lived together in the sub-continent without understanding one another's faiths."

"It is like reading of a land periodically devastated by hordes of lemmings or locusts; it is like turning from the history of a coral reef, in which every act and every death is a foundation, to the depressing chronicle of a succession of castles built on the waste sand of the sea-shore. This is Woodruff on the difference between European history and Indian history. He has chosen his images well. But the sandcastle is not quite exact. The sandcastle is flattened by the tide and leaves not trace, and India is above all the land of ruins."

"To be a history in the true sense of the word, the work must be the story of the people inhabiting a country. It must be a record of their life from age to age presented through the life and achievements of men whose exploits become the beacon-lights of tradition; through the characteristic reaction of the people to physical and economic conditions; through political changes and vicissitudes which create the forces and conditions which operate upon life; through characteristic social institutions, beliefs and forms; through literary and artistic achievements; through the movements of thought which from time to time helped or hindered the growth of collective harmony; through those values which the people have accepted or reacted to and which created or shaped their collective will; through efforts of the people to will themselves into an organic unity. The central purpose of a history must, therefore, be to investigate and unfold the values which, age after age, have inspired the inhabitants of a country to develop their collective will and to express it through the manifold activities of their life. Such a history of India is still to be written."

"The history of India is not the story of how she underwent foreign invasions, but how she resisted them and eventually triumphed over them.... To be a history in the true sense...the work must be the story of the people inhabiting a country. It must be a record of their life from age to age presented through the life and achievements of men whose exploits become the beacon lights of tradition...the central purpose of a history must...be to investigate and unfold the values which age after age have inspired the inhabitants of a country to develop their collective will...such a history of India is still to be written. ... I had long felt the inadequacy of our so called Indian histories...for many years, I was planning an elaborate history of India in order... that the world might catch a glimpse of her soul as Indians see it."

"India could not escape the fate of being conquered [by England], and the whole of her past history, if it be anything, is the history of the successive conquests she has undergone. Indian society has no history at all, at least no known history. What we call its history, is but the history of the successive intruders who founded their empires on the passive basis of that unresisting and unchanging society."

"Indian society has no history at all, at least no known history. What we call its history, is but the history of the successive intruders who founded their empires on the passive basis of that unresisting and unchanging society. The question, therefore, is not whether the English had a right to conquer India, but whether we are to prefer India conquered by the Turk, by the Persian, by the Russian, to India conquered by the Briton.” England had to fulfill a double mission in India: One destructive, and the other regenerating - the annihilation of old Asiatic society, and the laying of the material foundations of Western society in Asia. Arabs, Turks, Tartars, Moguls, who had successively overrun India, soon became Hinduised, the barbarian conquerors being, by an eternal law of history, themselves conquered by the superior civilization of their subjects. [According to him the British were the first conquerors who were superior, and therefore inaccessible to Hindu civilization. They destroyed it by breaking up the native communities, by uprooting the native industry, and by levelling all that was great and elevated in the native society. The historic pages of their rule in India, report hardly anything beyond that destruction.] “The work of regeneration hardly transpires through a heap of ruins. Nevertheless, it has begun."

"Indians of old were keenly alive to the expansion of dominions, acquisition of wealth, and the development of trade, industry and commerce. The material prosperity they gained in these various ways was reflected in the luxury and elegance that characterized the society... The adventurous spirit of the Indians carried them even as far as the North Sea, while their caravans traveled from one end of Asia to the other."

"History is the one weak spot in Indian Literature. It is, in fact, non-existent."

"The effort to read the problem of India in the set terms of Marxism is rather an exercise in ingenuity than a serious intellectual contribution to socialist advance."

"The history of modern India tells us a complex, surprising, captivating, and yet unconcluded story of freedom. It is appropriate to express a Tocquevillesque astonishment at this historical phenomenon. If we look from age to age, from the earliest antiquity to the present day, we can agree with Tocqueville that nothing like this has ever happened before. We have not yet seen the end of this unprecedented historical process… For, the eventual shape of the destination of this process might be unclear, but the movement towards a greater expansion of freedom is irreversible."

"Nothing should more deeply shame the modern student than the recency and inadequacy of his acquaintance with India. Here is... an impressive continuity of development and civilization from Mohenjo-daro, 2900 B.C. or earlier, to Gandhi, Raman and Tagore; faiths compassing every stage from barbarous idolatry to the most subtle and spiritual pantheism; philosophers playing a thousand variations on one monistic theme from the Upanishads eight centuries before Christ to Shankara eight centuries after him; scientists developing astronomy three thousand years ago, and winning Nobel prizes in our own time; a democratic constitution of untraceable antiquity in the villages, and wise and beneficent rulers like Ashoka and Akbar in the capitals; minstrels singing great epics almost as old as Homer, and poets holding world audiences today; artists raising gigantic temples for Hindu gods from Tibet to Ceylon and from Cambodia to Java, or carving perfect palaces by the score for Mogul kings and queens—this is the India that patient scholarship is now opening up, like a new intellectual continent, to that Western mind which only yesterday thought civilization an exclusively European thing.” ... We cannot tell yet whether, as Marshall believes, Mohenjo-daro represents the oldest of all civilizations known. But the exhuming of prehistoric India has just begun; only in our time has archeology turned from Egypt across Mesopotamia to India. When the soil of India has been turned up like that of Egypt we shall probably find there a civilization older than that which flowered out of the mud of the Nile."

"In the present context, the link between history-writing and actual politics is extra-ordinarily strong. Witness the crucial role of the Aryan invasions theory in the secularist and casteist/Ambedkarist ideologies, as earlier in the missionary and colonial ideologies. In fact, I can not think of any situation in world history where history-writing was so intertwined with both long- term political philosophy and short-term political equations. This is partly because an unusually large chunk of India's history is fundamentally under debate, either because it has not yet been mapped (so many unknowns may be decided on overnight once the Indus script is conclusively deciphered), or because it has been questioned for ideological reasons even while well-established (like the denial of Islam's utterly destructive role). Nowhere else can so much be read into history according to one's ideological compulsions, because nowhere else is so much history so undecided and disputed."

"Historians usually focus their attention on the past of countries that still exist, writing hundreds and thousands of books on British history, French history, German history, Russian history, American history, Chinese history, Indian history, Brazilian history or whatever. Whether consciously or not, they are seeking the roots of the present, thereby putting themselves in danger of reading history backwards. As soon as great powers arise, whether the United States in the twentieth century or China in the twenty-first, the call goes out for offerings on American History or Chinese History, and siren voices sing that today’s important countries are also those whose past is most deserving of examination, that a more comprehensive spectrum of historical knowledge can be safely ignored."

"“At most periods of her history India, though a cultural unit, has been torn by internecine war. In statecraft, her rulers were cunning and unscrupulous. Famine, flood and plague visited her from time to time, and killed millions of her people. Inequality of birth was given religious sanction, and the lot of the humble was generally hard. Yet our overall impression is that in no other part of the ancient world were the relations of man and man, and of man and the state, so fair and humane. In no other early civilisation were slaves so few in number, and in no other ancient lawbook are their rights so well protected as in the Arthasastra. No other ancient lawgiver proclaimed such noble ideals of fair play in battle as did Manu. In all her history of warfare Hindu India has few tales to tell of cities put to the sword or of the massacre of non-combatants…There was sporadic cruelty and oppression no doubt, but, in comparison with conditions in other early cultures, it was mild. To us the most striking feature of ancient Indian civilisation is its humanity.” (pp.8-9)]."

"The age in which true history appeared in India was one of great intellectual and spiritual ferment. Mystics and sophists of all kinds roamed through the Ganga Valley, all advocating some form of mental discipline and asceticism as a means to salvation; but the age of the Buddha, when many of the best minds were abandoning their homes and professions for a life of asceticism, was also a time of advance in commerce and politics. It produced not only philosophers and ascetics, but also merchant princes and men of action."

"In actual life, it is impossible to separate us into two nations. We are not two nations. Every Moslem will have a Hindu name if he goes back far enough in his family history. Every Moslem is merely a Hindu who has accepted Islam. That does not create nationality. … We in India have a common culture. In the North, Hindi and Urdu are understood by both Hindus and Moslems. In Madras, Hindus and Moslems speak Tamil, and in Bengal, they both speak Bengali and neither Hindi nor Urdu. When communal riots take place, they are always provoked by incidents over cows and by religious processions. That means that it is our superstitions that create the trouble and not our separate nationalities."

"The very word Urdu came into being as the original Lashkari dialect, in other words, the language of the army."

"“The poets of Delhi, proud of the ‘pure’ Urdu of the imperial camp… rejected the Dakani principle and practice of borrowing extensively from the Indian languages, especially if these borrowings were related to Hindu religion, culture and world-view… In this process imagery was drawn exclusively from Persian precedents, i.e., from the unseen and unexperienced sights, sounds and smells of Persia and Central Asia, rejecting totally the Indian sights, sounds and sensuous experience as materials regarded not sublime enough for poetic expression… It was a desperate unconscious clinging to the origins of the symbols of Muslim India’s cultural experience which had begun abroad, and an instinctive fear of being submerged into the Hindu cultural milieu. These modes of aesthetic appreciation, rooted so deeply in the essence of universal Islamic culture, remained more or less incomprehensible to the Hindu mind."

"In this catalogue of new demands there are some which on the face of them are extravagant and impossible, if not irresponsible. As an instance, one may refer to the demand for fifty-fifty and the demand for the recognition of Urdu as the national language of India. ... Their claim for the recognition of Urdu as the national language of India is equally extravagant. Urdu is not only not spoken all, over India but is not even the language of all the Musalmans of India. Of the 68 millions of Muslims, only 28 millions speak Urdu. The proposal of making Urdu the national language means that the language of 28 millions of Muslims is to be imposed particularly upon 40 millions of Musalmans or generally upon 322 millions of Indians."

"Urdu is a common denominator. It is the national language (national language of Pakistan). People in all the provinces of Pakistan speak Urdu."

"In fact this mixture of locals and foreigners gave birth to the language later known as "Urdu" in Lahore that was called Lashkari Zaban (language of the army) at that time."

"After he (Abdul Haq) migrated to Pakistan, he said, at a meeting in Karachi held to celebrate the 92nd birth anniversary of Ghalib on 15 February 1961, something quite different —as this short extract from the press report appearing in the official fortnightly bulletin of the Anjuman Taraqqui-e-Urdu (Pakistan) shows: In his presidential speech Baba-e-Urdu [Abdul Haq) expressing his unhappiness over the disregard shown to Urdu in Pakistan said that Pakistan was not created by Jinnah, nor was it created by Iqbal; it was Urdu that created Pakistan. The fundamental reason for the discord between the Hindus and the Muslims was the Urdu language. The entire two-nation theory and all other differences of this nature issued solely from Urdu. Therefore, Pakistan owes a debt of gratitude to Urdu. Coming from the father of the Urdu Movement this was a stunning revelation."

"Urdu literary culture from the late eighteenth century on- ward does place an unfortunate stress, which is also entirely disproportion- ate to their value, on “purism,” “language reform,” “purging the language of undesirable usages,” and—worst of all—privileging all Persian-Arabic over all Urdu. Urdu is the only language whose writers have prided themselves on “deleting” or “excising” words and phrases from their active vocabulary. Instead of taking pride in the enlargement of vocabulary, they took joy in limiting the horizon of language, to the extent of banishing many words used even by literate speakers or their own ustads."

"Although Urdu in form of Zuban-I Urdu-yi Mu'lla was already in use during the reign of Emperor Shajahan and referred to as Lashkari Zaban, Muhammed Shah made it popular among his people, declaring it to be his Court Language. In his respect, Lashkari or Urdu replaced Farsi or Persian, which was being used and understood by fewer and fewer individuals."

"It is equally important to know that Urdu poetry came under the influence of Persian poetry at a time when the latter had fallen into decadence. The result was that our poetry was tainted with narrowness and artificiality at the very outset of its career. ... Urdu poetry lacks freshness because, among other things presently to be discussed, it leaves out observation and borrows its imagery wholesale from Persia. From this it naturally follows that our medieval poetry, especially the gha^al^ has no local colour. In this respect, the contrast between Urdu poetry and Hindi and Punjabi and Sanskrit poetry is striking. The latter have grown out of the soil and absorbed its natural wealth and social background. And for this reason they make a deeper ap- peal to us than Urdu poetry. One of the most unfailing sources of aesthetic enjoyment in poetry lies in the idealization and recognition in it of things we see and love in life. It is not only that the sights and scenes we are familiar with come crowding to the mind when des- cribed in poetry and make the poetic experience richer and more significant. By far the greatest function of poetry, as I take it, is to send us back to life with an increased zest for it: it is a training for a fuller and more significant life. Your heart will not dance with the daffodils unless you have seen them disporting in the air, like Words- worth; and if you have seen them under the lead of the poet’s imagination, then your observation of them in future will acquire associations which it did not have before. In this respect the poverty of Urdu poetry is too palpable to require further comment."

"A word from Urdu will be seen intruding into Hindi like a crow among swans, at one place, while at another, a Hindi word in the midst of Urdu will ruin the flavor like salt in a sweet dish."

"Urdu begins, as matter of commonsense have begun, as soon as the Ghaznavi armies got to Lahore in 1027 -and Lahore was nowhere near the area of Khari (and still less of Braj and Adhvani)"

"Let me make it very clear to you, it is no doubt that the state language of Pakistan is going to be Urdu and no other language. Anyone who tries to mislead you is really the enemy of Pakistan. Without state language, no nation can remain tied up solidly together and function. Look at the history of every government judgement substitute language. Therefore, so far as the State language is concerned, Pakistan's state language shall be Urdu."

"Islamism immediately revived the lost cause of Urdu behind the smoke-screen of this Communist campaign against Hindi. It lauded loudly when progressive Urdu poets like Firaq Gorakhpuri lampooned Hindi in a language which was largely unprintable. Simultaneously, Islamism started parading Urdu as the great language of culture and refinement which will be lost to India for good if Urdu was allowed to go under. No Communist came forward to examine this “culture and refinement as a legacy of decadent Muslim courts and a frivolous Muslim aristocracy. No Communist questioned the heavy Persianisation and Arabicisation of Urdu which made it incomprehensible even to educated people, leave alone the man in Chandni Chowk. The recognition of Urdu as a second language has today become a sine qua non of Secularism."

"“Throughout the whole range of Urdu literature in its first phase… the atmosphere of this literature is provokingly un-Indian - it is that of Persia. Early Urdu poets never so much as mention the great physical features of India - its Himalayas, its rivers like the Ganges, the Jamuna, the Sindhu, the Godavari, etc; but of course mountains and streams of Persia, and rivers of Central Asia are always there. Indian flowers, Indian plants are unknown; only Persian flowers and plants which the poet could see only in a garden. There was a deliberate shutting of the eye to everything Indian, to everything not mentioned or treated in Persian poetry… A language and literature which came to base itself upon an ideology which denied on the Indian soil the very existence of India and Indian culture, could not but be met with a challenge from some of the Indian adherents of their national culture; and that challenge was in the form of highly Sanskritized Hindi’.”"

"Like the other Dravidian languages, Tamil is characterized by a series of retroflex consonants (/ḍ/, /ṇ/, and /ṭ/) made by curling the tip of the tongue back to the roof of the mouth. Structurally, Tamil is a verb-final language that allows flexibility regarding the order of the subject and the object in a sentence. Adjectives and relative, adverbial, and infinitive clauses normally precede the term they modify, while inflections such as those for tense, number, person, and case are indicated with suffixes."

"Within Tamil Nadu there are phonological differences between the northern, western, and southern speech. Regional varieties of the language intersect with varieties that are based on social class or caste."

"Spoken Tamil has changed substantially over time, including changes in the phonological structure of words. This has created diglossia—a system in which there are distinct differences between colloquial forms of a language and those that are used in formal and written contexts. The major regional variation is between the form spoken in India and that spoken in Jaffna (Sri Lanka), capital of a former Tamil city-state, and its surrounds."

"The Tamil writing system evolved from the Brahmi script. The shape of the letters changed enormously over time, eventually stabilizing when printing was introduced in the 16th century CE. The major addition to the alphabet was the incorporation of Grantha letters to write unassimilated Sanskrit words, although a few letters with irregular shapes were standardized during the modern period. A script known as Vatteluttu (“Round Script”) is also in common use."

"The earliest Tamil writing is attested in inscriptions and potsherds from the 5th century BCE. Three periods have been distinguished through analyses of grammatical and lexical changes: Old Tamil (from about 450 BCE to 700 CE), Middle Tamil (700–1600), and Modern Tamil (from 1600)."

"In 2004 Tamil was declared a classical language of India, meaning that it met three criteria: its origins are ancient; it has an independent tradition; and it possesses a considerable body of ancient literature. In the early 21st century more than 66 million people were Tamil speakers."