ABSTRACT
As one of the official state languages of India, Marathi is spoken by about 70 million people in Maharāshtra, with some degree of spread into adjacent territories. There are also outlier groups of Marathi speakers in Dravidian country. A further 20 million in India speak it as a second language. There are three main dialects: Dēsī, the base for the modern standard literary language; Kōṅkaçi, the dialect spoken in the Konkan coastal region (not to be confused with – albeit similar – Konkani, spoken in Goa and the official language of that state); and Eastern Marathi, which shades gradually into Oriya and Eastern Hindi.
