Ancient era Modern era During the medieval era, the Indian languages had taken in a lot of Perso-Arabic influences as a result of Muslim invasions, particularly in the
northwestern subcontinent; colonial-era education policies,
religious nationalism, and the influence of some of the more Sanskritised Indian languages played a role in Hindus and Muslims increasingly separating in terms of their linguistic influences, with Hindus tending towards the usage of Sanskrit words and the
Brahmic Devanagari script for writing
Hindi while Muslims opting for a more
Perso-Arabic vocabulary or
Nastaliq Arabic script for writing
Urdu. Since the 1947
Partition of India, the Indian government, which at one point considered making Sanskrit the national language, instead has sought to further Sanskritise Hindi, considering it to be easier for Indians to learn, and as a way of distancing Hindi from the Urdu spoken in the newly formed country of Pakistan (though Urdu continues to have official status in several Indian states, such as
Uttar Pradesh). Sanskrit has been used to form
new words to describe modern concepts and technologies in several South Asian languages by forming
calques based on English words. In addition, Sanskrit words that have been nativised into other languages have been mixed with words from other language families, such as the
Dravidian languages, to form new words. Cultural debates have emerged over how much Sanskrit should appear in Hindi and how acceptable Persian and English influences should be, with
Hindu nationalists favouring Sanskritised Hindi, opposing Urdu in part because of its association with
Islam, and some
boycotting the Hindi-language
Bollywood film industry for featuring too much Urdu and English vocabulary in its movies. == De-Sanskritisation ==