National languages: English is the most important language for national, political, and commercial communication; Hindi is the national language and primary tongue of 30% of the people; Assamese, Bengali, Bodo, Dogri, Gujarati, Kannada, Kashmiri, Konkani, Maithili, Malayalam, Manipuri, Marathi, Nepali, Oriya, Punjabi, Sanscrit, Santhali, Sindhi, Tamil, Telugu, and Urdu; Hindustani is spoken widely throughout northern India