The Indian/regional language paper, officially called Paper ‘A’ is the first paper in the UPSC civil services mains exam. Although only qualifying in nature, candidates are advised not to ignore its preparation as failure to score the minimum required marks will lead to their failure to clear the mains implying the loss of a precious attempt. The UPSC allows candidates to choose from a list of 22 modern Indian languages given in the 8th schedule of the Indian Constitution. Read on to know the statistics regarding the number of candidates for each language in the UPSC mains exam.
The most popular language taken by candidates in Paper-A (UPSC language paper) is Hindi — One of the official languages of India. On an average about 65% of the candidates choose Hindi for Paper-A, and the rest 35% take up any one of the remaining languages.
UPSC Language Paper
| Assamese | Bengali | Gujarati | Hindi | Kannada | Kashmiri |
| Konkani | Malayalam | Manipuri | Marathi | Nepali | Odia |
| Punjabi | Sanskrit | Maithili | Tamil | Telugu | Urdu |
| Bodo | Dogri | Sindhi (Devanagari/Arabic script) | Santhali (Devanagari/Olchiki script) | ||
The following figures have been compiled from the annual reports published by the UPSC every year. It gives the number of candidates opting the various Indian languages from the year 2010 to 2015.
| Language | 2010 | 2011 | 2012 | 2013 | 2014 | 2015 |
| Hindi | 8418 | 7233 | 7888 | 8820 | 10650 | 9358 |
| Marathi | 769 | 828 | 1074 | 1524 | 1442 | 1418 |
| Telugu | 700 | 722 | 795 | 1096 | 1276 | 1213 |
| Tamil | 561 | 624 | 649 | 806 | 742 | 747 |
| Kannada | 337 | 342 | 400 | 347 | 507 | 484 |
| Malayalam | 223 | 329 | 387 | 375 | 395 | 340 |
| Gujarati | 96 | 101 | 98 | 127 | 161 | 192 |
| Punjabi | 228 | 257 | 245 | 335 | 434 | 319 |
| Bengali | 57 | 110 | 89 | 103 | 96 | 82 |
| Assamese | 18 | 37 | 40 | 31 | 39 | 34 |
| Odia | 89 | 104 | 84 | 113 | 136 | 130 |
| Kashmiri | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Konkani | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
| Sindhi (D) | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 1 |
| Sindhi (A) | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 3 | 2 |
| Sanskrit | 1 | 8 | 3 | 7 | 4 | 1 |
| Manipuri | 0 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 0 |
| Nepali | 3 | 4 | 5 | 8 | 10 | 7 |
| Bodo | 1 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 2 | 2 |
| Maithili | 1 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 1 |
| Santhali | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 |
| Urdu | 38 | 38 | 48 | 46 | 60 | 70 |
As you can see from the above table, the maximum number of candidates opted for Hindi through the years 2010 to 2015. Marathi is the language that is second to Hindi. It is closely followed by Telugu and Tamil. Malayalam, Punjabi and Kannada also have many takers.
Also, See | Tips to Tackle the Compulsory Indian Language Paper in UPSC Civil Services Mains
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