Hindi
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A language of India
596,000,000 in India, all users. L1 users: 339,000,000 in India (2011 census). L2 users: 257,000,000 (2019). Total users in all countries: 602,198,470 (as L1: 343,931,570; as L2: 258,266,900).
Widespread in north India: northern Bihar, Himachal Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Punjab, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, and Uttarakhand states; Delhi.
1 (National). Statutory national language (1950, Constitution, Article 343), also statutory provincial language in Bihar State and 12 other jurisdictions.
Khari Boli (Dehlavi, Kauravi, Khadi Boli, Khari, Khariboli, Vernacular Hindustani). Formal vocabulary borrowed from Sanskrit, de-Persianized, de-Arabicized. Literary Hindi, or Hindi-Urdu, has 4 varieties: Hindi (High Hindi, Nagari Hindi, Literary Hindi, standard Hindi); Urdu [urd]; Dakhini; Rekhta. Hindustani, though not listed separately in India, refers here to the unofficial lingua franca of northwest India. Has a lexical mixture in varying proportions of Hindi (vocabulary derived from Sanskrit) and Urdu (vocabulary derived from Persian or Arabic).
SOV; postpositions; noun head final; content q-word in situ; gender (masculine/feminine); no articles; clause constituents partially indicated by case-marking (direct, oblique), postpositions, and word order; verbal affixation marks person, number, gender, and honorificity of subject; split ergativity; both tense and aspect; passives and voice; causatives; non-tonal; 30 consonants, 10 vowels, 2 diphthongs; stress linked to syllable weight.
Taught in all primary and secondary schools, more in northern India than in southern India. Taught in tertiary schools. Fully developed. Bible: 1835–2000.
Hindi, Hindustani, Urdu could be considered co-dialects, but have important sociolinguistic differences. Hindu.