Karnataka Cabinet Grants Tulu Additional Official Language Status in Dakshina Kannada and Udupi

The news

Mangaluru, Karnataka. The Karnataka Cabinet, meeting in Mangaluru on September 18, decided to accord additional official (administrative) language status to Tulu, a language commonly spoken in Dakshina Kannada district, the southern parts of Udupi district and the northern parts of Kasaragod district in Keralam, The Hindu’s explainer reports. Chief Minister D.K. Shivakumar said the status would apply to administrative matters in the two Karnataka districts, and that the government would release ₹82 lakh annually for translation, training and language-usage purposes. B. Shivarama Shetty, former Project Director of the Centre of Excellence for Studies in Classical Kannada at the Central Institute of Indian Languages (CIIL), Mysuru, explained that elected representatives would be able to speak in Tulu at gram sabhas and at gram, taluk and zilla panchayat meetings, and at urban local body meetings such as city corporation, city municipal council and town municipal council meetings; government circulars and orders in the two districts should also carry Tulu, and people can submit applications to departments in Tulu. On January 30, 2023, the then BJP government’s Kannada and Culture Minister V. Sunil Kumar formed a committee under M. Mohan Alva, Chairman of Alva’s Education Foundation, Moodbidri, to report within a week; the model code of conduct for the 2023 Assembly election, declared on March 29, 2023, intervened, and the BJP lost power. The Congress government then set up a committee under K.M. Gayatri, Director of Kannada and Culture, to study how Andhra Pradesh granted additional official status to Urdu; it visited Andhra Pradesh on January 19 and 20, 2026 and reported on March 4. The Cabinet decision is not self-executing. Section 2 of the Karnataka Official Language Act, 1963 names Kannada as the official language, and legal commentators quoted by the paper say the Act must be amended to add Tulu for the two districts, followed by the Governor’s assent and a notification — the route Andhra Pradesh and Telangana took for Urdu. Tulu is taught as a third optional language from Class 6 to 10 in the two districts since 2010-11; Mangalore University’s two-year postgraduate programme, begun in 2018-19, was wound up from 2024-25 for want of students. The Registrar General and Census Commissioner recognises Tulu as an independent language, but it is not in the Eighth Schedule. The syllabus link is Articles 343-351, on official languages.

Static syllabus linkage

1. Article 345 gives the State legislature, not the Cabinet, the power to choose its languages. Article 345 provides that, subject to Articles 346 and 347, the Legislature of a State may by law adopt any one or more of the languages in use in the State, or Hindi, as the language for all or any of its official purposes. The operative words are “by law”: an executive decision alone cannot make a language official. That is why Karnataka must amend its Official Language Act, 1963. Until a law is made, English continues for the purposes for which it was used before the Constitution.
2. Article 347 is the Centre’s route for a minority language inside a State. Article 347 allows the President, on a demand being made, to direct that a language spoken by a substantial proportion of a State’s population be officially recognised throughout the State or any part of it, if satisfied that such a proportion desires it. Article 346 fixes the language for communication between States and between a State and the Union. Article 350A directs States to provide instruction in the mother tongue at the primary stage for children of linguistic minority groups, and Article 350B provides for a Special Officer for Linguistic Minorities appointed by the President.
3. The Eighth Schedule is a separate list with separate consequences. The Eighth Schedule lists 22 languages. Sindhi was added by the 21st Amendment (1967); Konkani, Manipuri and Nepali by the 71st Amendment (1992); and Bodo, Dogri, Maithili and Santhali by the 92nd Amendment (2003). Inclusion does not make a language an official language of any State; it relates to Articles 344(1) and 351, on the Official Language Commission and the development of Hindi, and carries practical benefits such as recognition in certain examinations and by the Sahitya Akademi. Tulu remains outside it.
4. Tulu is a Dravidian language with its own script tradition. Tulu belongs to the South Dravidian branch of the Dravidian family and is spoken mainly in the coastal region historically called Tulu Nadu. The Census has long returned it as a separate language rather than a dialect of Kannada. It is today written largely in the Kannada script, although a historical Tulu script (Tigalari) exists. Kannada was declared a classical language by the Union government in 2008.

Why UPSC loves this

1. Official languages are a direct Prelims area. Articles 343 to 351 appear in the syllabus under “provisions of the Constitution”. UPSC has asked about the Eighth Schedule, about which languages are classical, and about the constitutional provisions on linguistic minorities. The distinction between an official language under Article 345 and a scheduled language is the classic trap.
2. Language politics recurs in GS1 and GS2. Linguistic reorganisation of States, regionalism and the three-language formula are GS1 society topics, while the demand for Eighth Schedule inclusion — Tulu, Bhojpuri, Rajasthani, Kurmali and others — is a GS2 federalism theme. This card also carries a panchayat angle: language of deliberation in gram sabhas bears directly on participation.

Analysis

1. The ₹82 lakh figure tells you the reform is symbolic unless the Act follows. Official status matters only where it creates enforceable rights: the right to file an application, receive a reply or read an order in one’s language. Those rights exist only once Section 2 of the 1963 Act is amended, because Article 345 requires a law. Until then the Cabinet decision is a statement of intent. The budget of ₹82 lakh a year across two districts funds translation and training at a modest scale, which suggests the government itself expects a gradual, not immediate, shift.
2. District-limited official status is the right design for a regional language. Declaring Tulu official across Karnataka would be meaningless in Kalaburagi and resented in Mysuru; confining it to Dakshina Kannada and Udupi matches the language to its speakers. This is the logic of Article 347, which speaks of recognition “throughout the State or such part thereof”. The Andhra and Telangana Urdu precedent shows the model is workable. The counter-view is that it multiplies administrative languages and may weaken Kannada as the unifying State language — a concern Karnataka’s own linguistic politics makes real.
3. The gram sabha provision is the most consequential part, and the least discussed. Allowing members to speak in Tulu at gram sabhas and panchayat meetings lowers the cost of participation for exactly the people the 73rd Amendment intended to empower. Deliberation in a language one thinks in is more than symbolism; it changes who speaks. The practical difficulty is the officer: a Panchayat Development Officer posted from outside the district who cannot follow the discussion will depend on an interpreter, and the record may still be kept in Kannada.
4. Official status and Eighth Schedule status are being run together in public debate, and they should not be. The Tulu movement’s larger demand has long been Eighth Schedule inclusion, which only Parliament can grant by constitutional amendment. The State’s decision does not advance that directly. It does, however, create an administrative record of use — circulars, applications, proceedings — which strengthens the case the next time a committee examines criteria for inclusion, since India has never fixed objective criteria for the Eighth Schedule.
5. Education is the weak leg of the policy. Tulu is taught only as a third optional language from Class 6 to Class 10, and Mangalore University closed its postgraduate programme from 2024-25 because too few students enrolled. An official language that young people cannot study beyond school will struggle to produce the translators and officers the policy needs. Status without a pipeline of trained users risks becoming ceremonial.

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