Colonial India’s dominant intelligentsia adopted a stratified three-track language division

Evidence

So one can never be sure, but certain patterns can be summarized. The dominant, more privileged strata among these new intelligentsias - often reflecting a nexus of class, caste, college degrees, and the upper layers of colonial serviceacknowledged the three-part division, came to adopt English as the main language of public function, but sometimes learned Sanskrit or/and Persian also, as the languages of scholastic and courtly eminence in India’s own past, while retaining the indigenous language for common discourse in household and community. — Aijaz Ahmad, In Theory, 1185

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Colonial education split Indian intellectuals into stratified, class-based functions — Aijaz Ahmad, In Theory: Nations, Classes, Literatures, 522

Broader Connections

• Colonial education split Indian intellectuals into stratified, class-based functions #expands (0.85) — Aijaz Ahmad, In Theory, 522