Which of the following is NOT a linguistic categorization of tribes in India?
Answer & explanation
Correct answer: option 4
The correct answer is Option (4) → Aryan
Option (4) Aryan — Not a linguistic category (Correct). In terms of language, tribes fall into four groups: Indo-Aryan, Dravidian, Austric and Tibeto-Burman. ‘Aryan’ belongs to the separate physical-racial classification, with Negrito, Australoid, Mongoloid and Dravidian. The language group is ‘Indo-Aryan’, so dropping ‘Indo-’ turns a language category into a racial one. One missing prefix changes the whole answer, so read each option to its last letter.
NCERT (2025-26): “Permanent Traits … In terms of language, tribes are categorised into four categories. Two of them, Indo-Aryan and Dravidian, are shared by the rest of the Indian population as well, and tribes account for only about 1% of the former and about 3% of the latter. The other two language groups, the Austric and Tibeto-Burman, are primarily spoken by tribals, who account for all of the first and over 80% of the second group. In physical-racial terms, tribes are classified under the Negrito, Australoid, Mongoloid, Dravidian and Aryan categories. The last two are again shared with the rest of the population of India.…” |