Assamese language in the past. There are also significant Assamese-speaking communities in Australia, Dubai, the United Kingdom, Canada, Nepal and the United States. Assamese is the official language of Assam, and one of the 23 official languages recognised by the Republic of India. The Assam Secretariat functions in Assamese. The Assamese phonemic inventory consists of eight vowels, ten diphthongs, and twenty-three consonants (including two semivowels). Consonant clusters in Assamese include thirty three pure consonant letters in the Assamese alphabet. Each letter represents a single sound with an inherent vowel, the short vowel . The first twenty-five consonants letters are called "sparxa barna"
Assamese language from the Kamarupi script. It very closely resembles the Mithilakshar script of the Maithili language, as well as the Bengali script. There is a strong literary tradition from early times. Examples can be seen in edicts, land grants and copper plates of medieval kings. Assam had its own system of writing on the bark of the "saanchi" tree in which religious texts and chronicles were written. The present-day spellings in Assamese are not necessarily phonetic. "Hemkosh" ( ), the second Assamese dictionary, introduced spellings based on Sanskrit, which are now the standard. The Assamese language has the following characteristic morphological