Editing Gujarati language (section)

== Demographics and distribution ==

[[File:Jinnah Gandhi.jpg|thumb|right|upright=1.15|[[Muhammad Ali Jinnah]] and [[Mahatma Gandhi]] were both native Gujarati speakers<ref>{{cite book|title=Encyclopedia of Post-Colonial Literatures in English|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=nGfMAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA563|quote=Gandhi's seminal work, 'Hind Swaraj' ('Indian Home Role'), appeared in the columns of ''Indian Opinion'' in 1909. Originally written in his mother tongue, Gujarati, it was translated into English by Gandhi and published as ''Hind Swaraj'' or ''Indian Home Role'' in 1910.|first=Eugene|last=Benson|publisher=[[Routledge]]|date=30 November 2004|page=563|isbn=9781134468485}}</ref><ref name="story">{{cite web| url=http://www.storyofpakistan.com/person.asp?perid=P009| title=Muhammad Ali Jinnah (1876–1948)| first=Story of Pakistan| last=Timeline: Personalities| access-date=12 May 2007}}</ref> but the former one advocated for the use of [[Urdu]].]]

Of the approximately {{sigfig|61.953120|2}} million speakers of Gujarati in 2022, roughly {{sigfig|60.200000|2}} million resided in India, 250,000 in [[Tanzania]], {{sigfig|208,000|2}} in Kenya, and some thousands in Pakistan. Many Gujarati speakers in Pakistan are [[language shift|shifting]] to Urdu;<ref name=e25/> however, some [[Gujarati people|Gujarati]] community leaders in Pakistan claim that there are 3 million Gujarati speakers in Karachi.<ref name="Rehman-2015">{{Cite news|url=https://www.thenews.com.pk/print/57104-with-a-handful-of-subberstwo-newspapers-barely-keeping-gujarati-alive-in-karachi|title=With a handful of subbers, two newspapers barely keeping Gujarati alive in Karachi|last=Rehman|first=Zia Ur|date=18 August 2015|work=The News International|quote=In Pakistan, the majority of Gujarati-speaking communities are in Karachi including Dawoodi Bohras, Ismaili Khojas, Memons, Kathiawaris, Katchhis, Parsis (Zoroastrians) and Hindus, said Gul Hasan Kalmati, a researcher who authored "Karachi, Sindh Jee Marvi", a book discussing the city and its indigenous communities. Although there are no official statistics available, community leaders claim that there are three million Gujarati-speakers in Karachi – roughly around 15 percent of the city's entire population.|access-date=14 January 2017}}</ref>

[[Mahatma Gandhi]] used Gujarati to serve as a medium of literary expression. He helped to inspire a renewal in its literature,{{sfnp|Dalby|1998|p=237}} and in 1936 he introduced the current spelling convention at the [[Gujarati Sahitya Parishad|Gujarati Literary Society]]'s 12th meeting.{{sfnp|Mistry|1997|p=654}}<ref>{{cite news|title=Jinnah didn't know Urdu, was fluent in Gujarati|url=https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Jinnah-didnt-know-Urdu-was-fluent-in-Gujarati/articleshow/4950044.cms|newspaper=[[The Times of India]]|date=30 August 2009|access-date=18 February 2018}}</ref>

Some [[Mauritians]] and many [[Réunion]] islanders are of Gujarati descent and some of them still speak Gujarati.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/surat/french-island-la-reunion-is-home-to-several-gujaratis/articleshow/55988312.cms|title=French island La Reunion is home to several Gujaratis|newspaper=[[The Times of India]]|access-date=11 February 2022}}</ref>

A considerable Gujarati-speaking population exists in [[North America]], especially in the [[New York City Metropolitan Area]] and in the [[Greater Toronto Area]], which have over 100,000 speakers and over 75,000 speakers, respectively, but also throughout the major metropolitan areas of the United States and Canada. According to the 2016 census, Gujarati is the fourth most-spoken South Asian language in Toronto after [[Hindustani language|Hindustani]], [[Punjabi language|Punjabi]] and [[Tamil language|Tamil]].

The UK has over 200,000 speakers, many of them situated in the London area, especially in North West London (in [[Harrow, London|Harrow]] and [[Wembley]]), but also in [[Birmingham]], [[Manchester]], and in [[Leicester]], [[Coventry]], [[Rugby, Warwickshire|Rugby]], [[Bradford]] and the former mill towns within [[Lancashire]]. A portion of these numbers consists of [[East Africa]]n Gujaratis who, under increasing discrimination and policies of Africanisation in their newly independent resident countries (especially [[Uganda]], where [[Idi Amin]] expelled 50,000 Asians), were left with uncertain futures and [[citizenship]]s. Most, with British [[passport]]s, settled in the UK.{{sfnp|Dalby|1998|p=237}}{{sfnp|Dwyer|1995|p=273}} Gujarati is offered as a [[GCSE]] subject for students in the UK.

Some Gujarati parents in the diaspora are not comfortable with the possibility that their children will not be fluent in the language.<ref name=lang>{{cite book|title=Language in South Asia|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=O2n4sFGDEMYC&pg=PA531|page=531|first1=Braj B.|last1=Kachru|first2=Yamuna|last2=Kachru|first3=S. N.|last3=Sridhar|publisher=[[Cambridge University Press]]|year=2008|isbn=9781139465502}}</ref> In a study, 80% of [[Malayali]] parents felt that "Children would be better off with English", compared to 36% of [[Kannada people|Kannada]] parents and only 19% of Gujarati parents.<ref name=lang />

Besides being spoken by the [[Gujarati people]], many non-Gujarati residents of [[Gujarat]] also speak it, among them the [[Kutch]]is (as a [[literary language]]{{sfnp|Dalby|1998|p=237}} and the [[Parsi people|Parsis]] (adopted as a [[First language|mother tongue]]).

=== Official status ===
Gujarati is one of the twenty-two [[official language]]s and fourteen [[regional language]]s of India. It is officially recognised in the state of Gujarat and the union territory of Dadra and Nagar Haveli and Daman and Diu.

Gujarati is recognised and taught as a minority language in the states of [[Rajasthan]], [[Madhya Pradesh]], [[Maharashtra]], and [[Tamil Nadu]] and the union territory of [[Delhi]].<ref>{{cite web|title=51st Report of the Commissioner for Linguistic Minorities in India|url=http://nclm.nic.in/shared/linkimages/NCLM51stReport.pdf|website=nclm.nic.in|publisher=[[Ministry of Minority Affairs]]|date=15 July 2015|access-date=15 February 2018|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180216025959/http://nclm.nic.in/shared/linkimages/NCLM51stReport.pdf|archive-date=16 February 2018}}</ref>
{{See also|States of India by Gujarati speakers}}