Sanskrit is perhaps one of the oldest languages in the world. It is often debated if Sanskrit or Tamil is older. But nevertheless, all languages have their innate beauty. However, Sanskrit is one such language that is close to majority of Indians since most of out ancient texts are from the same language.
This thousand years old language has lost its way to the mainstream, but thanks to some of the villages in India, it is still alive where it is used in day to day communication purposes.
Visit to these villages will be an enriching experience. Here are some Sanskrit speaking villages in India:
Mattur, Karnataka
A small village with about 3000 residents, Mattur is in Shimoga district and about 300km from Bangalore. Though the official language is Kannada, but most of the residents use Sanskrit in their day to day communication. It indeed can be a hearing delight by listening to Sanskrit that is also soothing to the ears. It may be difficult to grasp for most of us but you will certainly enjoy the rich language that is still alive.
Try talking to the village priests, kids and other people. I bet you will not have had an experience like this before. It is mainly inhabited by Sankethis, a Brahmin community that migrated from the state of Kerala hundreds of years ago and settled in Mattur.
You can also see the Shiva temple, Someshwara and Lakshmikeshava temple.
Jhiri, Madhya Pradesh
I am sure the image above can excite you to go and have a visit to this village. Located in the center state of MP and about 150km from Indore, Jhiri is a very small village with a population of about 1000 people.
Samskrita Bharati, an NGO that works for the democratisation and preservation of our ancient language of Sanksrit took a camp in 2002 in Jhiri and since then most of the residents have been drawn to this language. It is also widely used in day to day communication.
Sasana, Odisha
The practice of passing on rich culture and traditional values to the next generation is very much alive in this tiny village of Odisha. With a population of around 400 people, every household boasts of 1 pundit who is well versed with Sanskrit.
In almost all the households, the head of the family makes sure that the baton passes to the next generation and the soul of the language is alive.
Ganoda, Rajasthan
This village in the Banswara District of Rajasthan comes under Udaipur division. It is about 500 km from Jaipur and if you every try a road trip of Rajasthan, then you should definitely visit this village.
It has an interesting story of its adoption of Sanskrit. The original language of the village was Wagadi but things changed when a new Sanskrit school was set up and classes till college. Almost all the students joined the school and learnt Sanskrit. The impact was so much that they started conversing in Sanskrit with their parents and eventually parents also picked up the language! Yes, from their Children!
And since, then the main mode of communication is Sanskrit.
Don't you want to visit this now?!!