Brij Bhasha (ब्रज भाषा), also called Braj Bhasha, Braj Bhakha, or Daihaati Zabaan (country tongue), is a Central Indian language closely related to Hindi. In fact it is usually considered to be a dialect of Hindi, and was the predominant literary language of North-Central India before the switch to Khariboli in the 19th century. It is spoken by more than 42,000 people in the nebulously defined region of Braj Bhoomi, which was a political state in the era of the Mahabharata wars. According to ancient Hindu texts such as the Shrimad Bhagavatam, the kingdom of King Kams is described as spreading through the Braj (also known as Vrij or Vraj), where the incarnation of Krishna was born and spent his childhood days. This region lies in the Agra-Mathura area, and stretches as far as the environs o