Malayalam was given the status of a classical language in:

Malayalam was declared a classical language by the Government of India on 23 May 2013. It became the fifth Indian language to get this status.

Order in which languages received classical status:

• Tamil was the first.
• Sanskrit followed.
• Telugu and Kannada were declared classical languages together.
• Malayalam was the fifth.
• Odia was the sixth, in 2014.
• Marathi, Pali, Prakrit, Assamese and Bengali were added in 2024.

About Malayalam:

• It is the main language of Kerala and the Union territory of Lakshadweep, and it is also spoken in Puducherry's Mahe district.
• It belongs to the Dravidian family of languages.
• It developed from early Tamil, with strong influence from Sanskrit.
• Its script evolved from the Vatteluttu and Grantha scripts.

Literary history:

• The earliest known Malayalam inscriptions date from around the 9th century CE.
• "Ramacharitam" is considered one of the earliest literary works in Malayalam.
• Thunchaththu Ezhuthachan, who wrote the "Adhyatma Ramayanam Kilippattu", is called the father of modern Malayalam.

Kumaran Asan, Vallathol Narayana Menon and Ulloor S. Parameswara Iyer are known as the triumvirate of modern Malayalam poetry.

• Sankara Kurup was the first winner of the Jnanpith Award, in 1965, for his Malayalam collection "Odakkuzhal".

Malayalam literature has won several Jnanpith Awards, including those to S.K. Pottekkatt, Thakazhi Sivasankara Pillai, M.T. Vasudevan Nair, O.N.V. Kurup and Akkitham.

Process of granting classical status:

• The demand was supported by the Kerala government with evidence of the language's antiquity and literary tradition.
• The Ministry of Culture accepted the recommendation of the linguistic experts' committee.

Benefits:

• International awards for eminent scholars.
• A Centre of Excellence for Studies in Classical Malayalam, which was set up at Tirur in Kerala.
• Professional chairs in central universities.

Eighth Schedule:

Malayalam is one of the 22 languages in the Eighth Schedule.

Why not the other options?

• ✗2004 is the year Tamil was declared classical.
• ✗2008 and 2014 relate to other languages.