NANDED

Language has played a central role in shaping India’s political and regional boundaries, particularly during the post-independence period. One of the most significant turning points was the States Reorganisation Act of 1956, which redefined state borders based on linguistic identity.

In the Marathwada region, which was formerly part of the Hyderabad State, this reorganisation brought major changes. After Hyderabad was merged into the Indian Union, areas with a dominant Marathi-speaking population, including Nanded district, were integrated into the state of Maharashtra in 1960. Even so today, much like any other part of India, Nanded is home to a range of language communities, each preserving its own way of speaking. While Marathi remains the most widely spoken language, others such as Urdu, Hindi, and Banjari are also significant. Smaller groups speak languages like Gondi and Ghisadi, reflecting the district’s deep-rooted linguistic diversity.

At the time of the 2011 Census, Nanded district had a total population of approximately 33.61 lakh (33,61,292). Of this population, 75.46% reported Marathi as their first language. Urdu was spoken by 9.63%, followed by Hindi (5.52%), Banjari (4.95%), and Telugu (2.10%). Other languages spoken as mother tongues included Gondi (0.83%), Lamani/Lambadi (0.29%), Marwari (0.28%), Kannada (0.24%), Punjabi (0.16%), Gujarati (0.14%), and Vadari (0.06%).

Gondi is a language spoken by the Gond people across central India, including states like Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Chhattisgarh, Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, Odisha, and Gujarat. In Nanded district, according to the 2011 Census, 27,934 people reported Gondi as their mother tongue, making up 0.83% of the district’s total population.

The origins of Gondi have been the subject of multiple theories. The traditional view maintains that Gondi has primarily existed as an oral language without a written script. However, it has been noted in the Languages of Maharashtra (2017) that this perspective has been challenged by scholars such as Motiram Kale, who argues that Gondi is an ancient language that once served as the official language of the ancient Gondwana Kingdom, complete with its own script and literary tradition. Scholar Vyankatesh Atram claims that hieroglyphs discovered in Gondwana are actually Gondi script and that it served as the official language of the Kuyava Kingdom in the pre-Rigveda period. According to this theory, the written script disappeared when Duryon, the Kuyava capital, was destroyed around 3201 BCE.

Despite these historical shifts, this language has endured beautifully in its oral form. Unfortunately, it has been classified as a “vulnerable language” in UNESCO’s 2009 report, which states that while most children still speak Gondi, its use may be restricted to certain domains.

Gondi is classified as part of the Dravidian language family in the Chandrapur Gazetteer (1972) and as mentioned above, is spoken across central India. However, rather than existing as a single uniform variety, Gondi exhibits significant dialectal diversity. The influence of surrounding languages, such as Hindi, Marathi, Telugu, Kannada, and Chhattisgarhi, has contributed to regional variations in pronunciation, vocabulary, and grammatical structures.

Gondi has a distinct sound system (phonology). It is listed in the volume Languages of Maharashtra (2017), that there are more than 13 vowel sounds (counting all the short, long, uncommon vowels and diphthongs) and more than 37 consonant sounds in the Gondi language. They are as follows:

Gondi includes a distinct set of kinship terms that differ and are phonologically unique.

Gondi is spoken differently across Gondia, Gadchiroli, Bhandara, Chandrapur, and Nanded in Maharashtra. In these areas, the language is in close contact with Hindi and Marathi, which has led to gradual shifts in vocabulary.

In many cases, original Gondi words have been replaced by borrowed forms, especially in everyday contexts. In other cases, certain words in Gondi may look or sound similar to words in Hindi or Marathi, but carry different meanings. For instance, The word मुलगी (mulgī) means mother’s elder sister in Gondi, whereas in Marathi, it means girl. These kinds of terms are often referred to as false friends [words that appear the same across two languages but differ in meaning].

Other terms, like सकार (sakār) for morning or दुपार (dupar) for afternoon, resemble their counterparts in Marathi and Hindi, and may be considered as borrowings which have slight alterations in the way they are pronounced and spelled.

Some Gondi words also have lexical overlap with Marathi and Sanskrit, that is they resemble terms in Marathi or Sanskrit in both sound and meaning. As noted in Languages of Maharashtra (2017), Vyankatesh Atram has pointed to certain Gondi terms as being possible sources for later Marathi words. For example:

• कलुष (kaluśa) – coal → is believed to be the possible source for the Marathi word कोळसा (kolasā)
  
• जावा उन्माल (jāva unmāl) – having a meal → similar to Marathi जेवण (jevaṇ)

While the direction of influence is debated, such overlaps point to long-standing interaction between Gondi and neighboring languages.

Ghisadi is a language variety spoken by the Ghisadi community, a group traditionally known for their work as blacksmiths and metalworkers. According to Deenanath Fulwadkar (2017), the community can predominantly be found in the Parbhani and Nanded districts of Maharashtra.

Historical records trace the origins of the Ghisadi community to Chittorgarh, Rajasthan. According to oral traditions, during the reign of Maharana Pratap, they were skilled metalworkers who forged iron tools for warfare and remained deeply loyal to him. Their migration from Rajasthan is linked to a significant historical event. Fulwadkar mentions in the volume Languages of Maharashtra (2017) that “when Akbar defeated Maharana Pratap, they vowed to return to the fort only when Chittorgarh was freed from Mughal rule.”

This pledge led them to migrate southward, eventually settling in Maharashtra. Over time, their linguistic identity, in many ways, evolved, adapting to regional linguistic influences while still maintaining elements of their historical heritage.

Like many language varieties, Ghisadi exhibits distinctive features in pronunciation, vocabulary, and grammatical structure that differentiates it from others. It has developed its own system of pronouns, verb endings, and kinship terms, while also borrowing words from other languages due to historical and cultural interactions.

Like many varieties, Ghisadi has a set of pronouns that refer to people in different contexts. These pronouns are different from those in neighboring languages and dialects, giving Ghisadi a distinct identity.

A distinctive feature of Ghisadi is the consistent use of the suffix व (va) at the end of verbs. This pattern applies across different actions and is a key characteristic of the language's verb system.

Kinship terms in Ghisadi reflect the community’s social structures and relationships. Some terms show distinct phonetic developments within the variety:

Languages often borrow words from each other when different communities interact, and Ghisadi demonstrates this linguistic phenomenon clearly. Perhaps through sustained contact with Marathi-speaking populations, Ghisadi has incorporated numerous Marathi terms into its vocabulary, particularly for everyday objects and descriptive terms.

These borrowed words, known in linguistics as loanwords, noticeably undergo a process of adaptation to fit Ghisadi’s pronunciation and word formation patterns. This process creates subtle but significant differences between the original Marathi terms and their Ghisadi counterparts. For example:

A pattern, which linguists refer to as vowel substitution, can be observed in the Ghisadi adaptation of Marathi words. In cases like पांढरा (pāṇḍhrā) → पांढरो (pāṇḍhro), the final vowel 'ā' (आ) in Marathi is replaced with 'o' (ओ) in Ghisadi.

Such systematic vowel changes are a common feature in language contact and borrowing. When words are adopted from one language into another, they often undergo slight modifications to better fit the phonological rules of the borrowing language. In Ghisadi, this 'ā' → 'o' shift helps integrate Marathi loanwords into its natural speech patterns.