Language

In 1961, there were 21 languages listed as mother-tongues of the inhabitants of the district; Hindi was spoken by 93.6%, urdu 6.3% and Punjabi by 0.1% of the total population. The number of persons who spoke other languages as there mother tongues was negligible. In the rural areas Hindi was found to be the mother tongue of 94.0% of the people and Urdu of 6.0%. In the urban area Hindi, Urdu and panjabi were the main mother tongues accounting for 71.6 , 24.9 and 2.6% respectively. The proportion of speakers of other languages was very small (0.9%).
The common language of the people of the district is the Avadhi dialect of Eastern Hindi. Avadhi means the language of the region known as Avadh, and since the ancient name of Avadh was Kosala, the language is also called Kosali. The district of Sultanpur lies in the eastern part of Avadh and its dialect is, therefore, called eastern Avadhi. In modern times, however, its place as a literary vehicle has been taken by the standard Hindi called Khari-boli which is also the official language of the State.
Following is the indicative break-up (as per census 1991) of the recognised languages being spoken as the mother tongue of the number of people of the district.

Sr.No
Language
No of People speaking
Percentage
1
Hindi
2379314
92.98%
2.
Urdu
178480
6.97%
3.
Panjabi
1097
.04%
4.
Bangla
41
--
5.
Others
30
--
Total
2558962
100%